On Friday, the San Diego County Registrar of Voters dropped off its first batch of outbound mail-in ballots at the post office.

Chances are good you'll find a ballot in your mailbox next week, but how can you be sure it gets to the right place when you send it back? 

For the vast majority of voters in San Diego County, finding a ballot in their mailbox is nothing new.

“San Diego voters have been used to voting by mail,” said Michael Vu, the San Diego Country Registrar of Voters. “Their preferred method is voting by mail.” 

In fact, 78 percent of San Diego County voters are already permanent mail-in voters. What is new is a way to track your ballot through the entire mailing process – it’s a lot like how you track a package through FedEx or UPS.

“We’ve always provided voters A to Z,” Vu said. “Now voters have the ability to see B through Y.”

It's free, easy and I did it in less than 5 minutes. Here's how:

One of the biggest challenges facing the election this year is simply the process. For the first time ever, all California voters will receive a ballot in the mail. Some voters are concerned their vote may not be counted. On top of that, voters are hungry for trustworthy information about candidates and issues. We take your questions about voting this year with Kim Alexander, president and founder of the nonpartisan California Voter Foundation. (Full Audio)

Things are different and there are questions. We're answering them live. 

The next election is speeding toward us on a runaway train of rhetoric, doubt, and deterrents. 

We have some facts, instead.

Election Day is technically November 3, but early voting starts soon after October 5 when ballots begin shipping out to every active, registered voter in California. 

In L.A., we'll be voting on: the next president of the United States, the head of the largest prosecutor's office in the country, affirmative action, a possible rollback of California Proposition 13, and much more. 

Pressure is high. But it's 2020, so the intensity doesn't end there. The actual process of voting is also different.

You'll be doing it possibly by mail, or at a new vote center, in the time of a historic pandemic, in the midst of a fury over racial inequity and police brutality, while the Golden State burns in the orange glow of climate change. 

Excerpts: 

Our journey through America’s varying levels of pandemic-voting preparedness continues this week with looks at Arkansas, California, Illinois, New Jersey and Vermont.

Every week, we’re looking at what states have done — or not done — to make voting easier during the coronavirus outbreak, where the fights over those moves have been the most contentious, and which states feature the kind of competitive races that could make things extra messy and volatile come November.

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California

If you want to know how serious California’s politicians are about mail-in voting during the COVID-19 pandemic — or at least, how serious they are about looking serious — check out the new bill signed into law on last week: SB 739 makes it a misdemeanor to intentionally mislead Californians about their right to vote by mail.