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Prepping for Election Day in Monroe County

Newswatch 16's Emily Kress spoke with election officials in Monroe County about the process of counting thousands of mail-in ballots on Election Day.

MONROE COUNTY, Pa. — The Monroe County Election Office in Stroudsburg is bustling with people in the final weeks leading up to the presidential election.

People also stopped by the administration building to drop off their mail-in ballots. 

As those mail in and absentee ballots come in, Election Director Sara May-Silfee says they are held at the office.

Then starting at 7 a.m. on election day, staff begin the process of getting those ballots ready to be counted. 

"We begin opening the outer envelopes, and then, of course, we take the secrecy out, and that is opened. Then we have to take the ballots out and unfold them, and then we count them from there," explained Silfee. 

So far in Monroe County, more than 27,717 voters have requested mail in ballots. Officials say it will be all hands on deck on election day to work through the process. 

"We use county employees to help, so I'm stealing from other departments that day to assist in the opening," said Silfee. 

The election office is also telling voters in Monroe County to be aware of an election phone scam that was recently reported to the office. 

"It is telling people to apply for a mail-in, get a mail-in and, sign the yellow secrecy envelope and date it, then put it in the outer envelope. If you sign that secrecy envelope, it's not going to count, and we won't know until election morning, so it's fake information that is going around," explained Silfee.

There is still one week left to request a mail-in ballot.

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