YOUNGSTOWN — There is still time to request a ballot by mail for the April 28 primary, but not a lot, Mahoning County elections officials said.

Though the primary is April 28, the deadline to request a ballot is noon April 25, so people need to consider the time it takes for multiple mailings, they said.

A request for a ballot could take a few days to arrive by mail at a county board of elections. Election officials say they’ve been processing those requests in a day or two, but it takes a few more days to have them arrive to voters by mail. That doesn’t leave people much time to then vote by mail and have it postmarked by the April 27 deadline. (Ballots postmarked by April 27 have until May 8 to arrive at boards of elections to be counted.)

Those who want to drop them off in-person at boards of elections have until 7:30 p.m. April 28 to do so.

Thomas McCabe, deputy director of the Mahoning County Board of Elections, said “If you request an application next week, it’s going to be tough. We’re now at a 24-hour turnaround on requests, but people shouldn’t wait much longer. People need to get applications back as soon as possible. There are time restraints.”

One problem at the Mahoning board , McCabe said, “is we can’t find enough help. We’re doing the best we can.”

Voters can request an absentee ballot by printing one out from the Ohio secretary of state’s website — voteohio.gov — or from a county board of elections website. The Mahoning board’s website is vote.mahoningcountyoh.gov.

The faster option — though it requires people to leave their homes during the COVID-19 pandemic — is to pick up an absentee ballot request at boxes outside board offices. The requests can be filled out immediately and put in the box outside those offices. Also, completed ballots can be placed in the boxes.

The Mahoning County Board of Elections address is 345 Oak Hill Ave., Suite 101, Youngstown, OH 44502.

As of Tuesday, the board had received numerous requests for ballots, but not a lot of completed ones.

Dr. Amy Acton, director of the Ohio Department of Health, canceled the March 17 in-person primary the night before it was to be held at the request of Gov. Mike DeWine because of public health concerns about the COVID-19 pandemic.

In Mahoning County, about 9,800 people voted early. Since March 17, there have been 14,200 requests for ballots with a little more than 5,000 returned. Mahoning County has 161,050 registered voters.

While absentee ballot requests are being processed quickly, McCabe said it took a while to get that started because the go-ahead to mail ballots from the secretary of state didn’t come until late March 27, a Friday. They didn’t start mailing ballots until March 30.

Another problem, McCabe said, is some people are requesting ballots without stating whether they want to vote Republican, Democratic or for issues only.

“Then we have to contact them and ask which ballot they want, which causes a delay,” he said.

The Mahoning board had more than 800 voicemails last weekend and gets about 400 to 500 calls a day, McCabe said.

“We’re fortunate we have only a few competitive races and a few levies on the ballot,” he said.

Secretary of State Frank LaRose and DeWine called for extended mail voting with in-person voting June 2.

But the state Legislature said that date was too late and voted for a bill with an April 28 primary with no in-person voting except for those with qualifying disabilities under the Americans with Disabilities Act and those without access to the postal system — primarily those who are homeless.

If the state opts for the November general election with virtually no in-person voting, election officials said they can handle that.

“It will be easier in the general election,” McCabe said. “We’d have more lead time and won’t need to worry about party affiliation.”

The count for this election shouldn’t take a long time, McCabe said.

Boards of elections are opening and scanning ballots, as they’ve done in past elections, and waiting to count them until the election officially closes at 7:30 p.m. April 28.

dskolnick@tribtoday.com