BUCYRUS — Ohio’s primary election was completed by early voting and absentee ballots by mail due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but not without some Ohioans raising concerns about the process not being voter friendly.

Misunderstandings about the information presented by Secretary of State Frank Larose, Gov. Mike DeWine and county boards of election through news media across the state left some voters feeling as though their voices were not heard.

Ruth Leuthold, director of the Crawford County Board of Elections, said after election day she received calls from people inquiring about the ballots they did not receive. She found many of the callers did not submit an application for a ballot.

“People were allowed to vote in the office on Tuesday if they had applied for a ballot but did not yet receive one in the mail,” Leuthold said. “Many people were under the impression that we send ballots out automatically but that is not how the process works.”

She said her staff allowed everyone to cast a provisional ballot who came to the office Tuesday but is waiting for clarification from the state to see if they will be counted if they had not sent in or dropped off their application for a ballot in the ballot box that was located at the main entrance of the courthouse for the past month.

“We received a total of 128 provisional ballots,” Leuthold said.

Crawford County has 27,429 registered voters and 6,623 ballots were cast in the primary election. Of the 24.15 percent of registered voters who cast a ballot on election day, 75.90 percent of registered Democratic voters casted ballots, 52.36 percent of registered Republican voters turned out for the election, and 1.47 percent of voters cast a non-partisan, issues-only ballot.

The board of elections will conduct the official vote count May 12 at 9 a.m.

“Even if all provisional ballots qualify, we did not have any races close enough for it to change the results enough to require an automatic recount which is if a race is close enough, within one-half of one percent,” Leuthold said.

After the official count May 12, the board will partake in a routine audit and is already looking ahead to the general election in November.

“The deadline for independents to file to run has passed but the deadline for write-ins is Aug. 24,” Leuthold said. “The deadline for issues to be placed on the ballot is Aug. 5.”

She said the deadline to register to vote for people who are not already a registered voter is Oct. 5.

For all information related to elections in Crawford County, visit the website at https://sites.google.com/site/crawfordboe/home or the Ohio Secretary of State website at https://www.sos.state.oh.us.