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'Optimistic but you never know': Voter anticipation grows one week to election day

Voter anticipation growing ahead of election day
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WAUKESHA — With just one week until Election Day, Waukesha city officials are continuing with voting machine testing.

The public test of voting tabulators in Waukesha will begin at 9 a.m. Tuesday. This process is required by state law and will help to ensure voting systems are working and any issues are avoided ahead of time. Once testing is completed, machines are secured until Election Day.

TMJ4's Sydni Eure stopped through Waukesha to check in with some early voters to see how things were moving along so far. She spoke with Kevin & Ginger Laveau, Oliva Schanen and Larry & Julie Litt as they were headed in and out of city hall.

Watch: Voters say things are moving smoothly ahead of Election Day.

Waukesha city officials prepare for election day with tabulator test

A common word they all used was "smooth." They said there were no problems or chaos. Maybe there was a short line or two but ultimately they said they were able to vote with ease.

“Very quick, was probably about 12 to 15 minutes," said early voter, Kevin Laveau. "Yeah, the technology was great, went smoothly.”

“Yeah, it was," agreed, early voter Ginger Laveau. "I’m not used to the electronic. We usually just pencil it in and it was very easy there lots of helpers and it was very efficient.”

Waukesha Early Voters
Kevin Laveau & Ginger Laveau head to the polls early to cast their ballot.

Linda Gourdoux with the City of Waukesha Clerks Office told Sydni the goal behind the machine testing on Tuesday is to make sure that ease will transition over into the election day process as well. Gourdoux said the plan is to go through and run sample ballots in each machine to make sure that it counts them properly. After that, they reset the tabulators to zero so they're ready to go come November 5th.

Schanen is a first-time early voter and she said she was also very pleased with the city's organization just as much as the Litt's.

"It was smooth," said Oliva Schanen. "I mean there were lines, but it went consistently."

First Time Early Voter
Oliva Schanen is a first-time early voter. She says the process was very smooth.

“Really good," said Julie Litt. "It went really smooth really fast and they were very informative.”

"Very organized and it went real smooth," said Larry Litt.

Waukesha Early Voting
Julie Litt & Larry Litt are eager for election day to get here.

Voters said they have already felt a buzz and sense of hopefulness in the air. They said the anticipation is building and they're ready for the big day to come.

"Optimistic," said Julie and Larry. "Very optimistic but you never know."

"Very positive, very positive," said Schanen.

"Excited for it to be over," said Kevin Laveau.

"Yeah, done with the ads on TV for sure." said Ginger Laveau.


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