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Advance voting begins for Vancouver election with 'daunting' ballot

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The ballot in Vancouver’s city election is one of the longest in the country, and voters are being encouraged to take advantage of advance polls that began opening Saturday.

Not only is voting early a good way to avoid long lines, it may also give voters extra time to complete a ballot that’s described as rather intimidating.

“Oh my gosh, it is absolutely daunting," said Danielle Johnston, manager of democratic engagement for the City of Vancouver.

“This is literally my job and I find it daunting,” she admitted.

There are 137 candidates running for various positions, and voters are being asked to choose 10 city councillors, seven park board commissioners, nine school trustees and one mayor.

There are also three capital plan questions.

“If you are a well-informed voter, you’ll know who you’re choosing, but it can be quite complicated for somebody who’s doing it for the first time,” said pollster Mario Canseco.

In a bid to make things equitable, candidates are listed randomly, not alphabetically. That means it will likely take voters longer to find their preferred candidates.

There is no need to vote in every category, nor is their a need to vote for all 10 councillors or all seven park board commissioners, and so on.

“Let’s say you only have five councillors you feel strongly about," said Johnston. "You can select those five, leave the other five spots blank, (and) that is a fully valid vote.”

But voters must be careful not to choose more candidates than indicated on the ballot, or their choices will be deemed invalid. For example, nine school trustees need to be elected. Voters can choose none, a few, or all nine, but if 10 candidates are marked, the vote won’t count.

“This is more like a 6/49 ticket,” said Canseco. “You have to be very careful about the way you do it, make sure that everything is going to count, and not put more names than you have to.”

The good news is that the computerized ballot tabulator will catch mistakes on the spot, and an election official can provide a new ballot once the erroneous one is destroyed.   

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