Excerpts:

More than a third of California voters have returned their ballots with less than a week before the election deadline. 

The latest numbers from Political Data Inc show 36% of California ballots have been returned as of Tuesday. 

“It’s going to really help process those ballots more rapidly and get us to final election results sooner than later,” Kim Alexander with the California Voting Foundation said. 

Results from those ballots aren’t being tallied up, they won’t be until Nov. 3.

County elections officials across the state are processing the incoming ballots to make sure they have verified signatures and are able to be scanned.

“Once the polls close, those ballots that are in house that have already been processed are the very first ballots that get counted,” Alexander said. 

If you’re thinking about mailing in your ballot, voting advocates suggest doing so soon. 

“It’s getting a little it late in the year to be mailing your ballot in, even though we have a post mark law in place. Anything you put in the mail starting this weekend, there’s really no guarantee that it will get posted by Election Day,” Alexander said. “You want to walk it into the post office, or you can take it to a drop box, or any voting site, your county elections office.”

Officials expect in person voting to pick up with polling places opening up in the majority of the state this weekend.  (Full Story)