Voting Procedures

You cast your ballot at the polling place designated to serve the precinct in which you reside.  If you are in doubt as to the location of the polling place, check out the Polling Place Locator  or call the Union County Board of Elections at 937-642-2836.

If you are physically unable to sign election-related documents, such as petitions, absentee request form and signature book, you may file an Attorney in Fact form with the Union County Board of Elections that allows a legally competent Ohio resident who is 18 years of age or older as an "attorney in fact" to sign the voter name to the election related document on the voter's behalf.  You may click on the following types of Attorney in Fact forms: Power of Attorney Executed Before a Notary Public   and Attorney in Fact Authorization with Physician Statement  .

Persons with a physical or mental disability or who are unable to read or write may be assisted by anyone of their own choice, except an employer or his/her agent, a union officer, or a candidate whose name appears on the ballot.  The voter may be assisted by two pollworkers of opposite political parties.  No one who assists a voter may disclose any information about how that person voted.

Under Ohio election law, you can change your political party at a Primary Election only.  This is done by requesting the ballot type for the political party with which you wish to be affilited.  Ohio Revised Code Section 3513.19.20

If you do not want to be affiliated with a political party in Ohio, you are considered to be an unaffiliated voter.  An unaffiliated voter, which is identified by some people as an "independent voter", may only vote an Official Question and Issues Ballot, if there are any present, for your precinct on Primary Election day.  Unaffiliated or independent voters can vote for candidates and issues in a General Election.

Ohio's primary process strikes a balance between the statutory deference to an individual voter's participatory rights and the policical parties' associative rights.  To protect this balance, Directive 2011-43 prohibits against any precinct election official or board of elections member, director, deputy director, or clerk from challenging the right to vote of any elector on the grounds that the voter is not affiliated with or is not a member of the political party whose ballot the person desires to vote, unless that official has personal knowledge to the contrary.  In these rare instances, either SOS Form 10-W  , 10-X   or 10-Z   should be used, depending on the circumstance, pursuant to R.C. 3510.06(D) and 3513.20.

*You may vote on issues only at a Primary without delcaring a Political Party*