By Aidan Mortensen | KOAL News

As election season is almost upon us, voter registration looms large for citizens across the country. In the Castle Country, voter registration – especially party affiliation – is important, as several races across the area appear to be decided at the primary level.

To help guide citizens through the ins and outs of voter registration, Carbon County Clerk/Auditor Seth Marsing joined the KOAL newsroom to provide critical information on the process, as well as pull back the curtain on what happens behind the scenes in his office.

Speaking first on first-time registrants, Marsing stated,” The best way is really to come into our office at the clerk’s office of the county building. We can help you with any questions you have and register you. You can also do it on vote.utah.gov. You can look at how you’re registered as well as if you’re not.”

Diving into the topic of switching voter affiliation, Marsing shared,” The ways I mentioned before, you can do it that way. But if you just want to find out how you’re registered or affiliated, you can check that on vote.utah.gov, but for sure, call our office. We’d love to chat. Or come in. Those are the best ways.”

He added, “The primary election is on June 23, and the affiliation deadline is April 1, so you need to be aware of that.”

Moving from the younger generation to the older generation, Marsing discussed how to remain an active voter: “As long as you’re participating in elections, you have to be voting every eight years to stay an active voter. So besides that, there’s not too much.”

Marsing provided a rundown of what interested parties should bring when registering to vote: “You do want to make sure that your address is current. That is a big deal, especially if you’ve moved recently or changed address for any reason. Again, you can check it on vote.utah.gov, call us, or come into our office to make sure you’ve got the correct address. And so the ballot gets to you, when it’s mailed out, that’s probably the biggest thing again, as we get closer to the primary, people may want to affiliate, to make sure that they’re getting the ballot they want.”

Switching to the behind-the-scenes perspective, Marsing explained what happens after the registration paperwork is handed over: “There’s a statewide voter registration database. So we check everything with the voter in person, and otherwise we check all the details of their registration to make sure they’re correct. Make sure they have their ID and all the required stuff. And then after that, we would enter it into the statewide voter registration database. And make sure we enter everything correctly in there. We keep an electronic and a physical copy too.”

Throughout the past year, Utah has seen several ballot initiatives that have required signature gathering and, therefore, signature verification. Marsing gave a glimpse into what this verification process entails: “There are some strict guidelines about how the packets are put together; what needs to be included for each signature and each voter. But as the signature packets come in, they’re assigned to one employee, and they go through the packet very thoroughly and verify each signature and make sure that it’s accurate and all the voter information is accurate with them.”

Closing our conversation, Marsing stated,” Just to reiterate, the primary election is on June 3, and the affiliation deadline is April 1. You mentioned the Republican Party. A lot of the candidates are affiliated with the Republican Party, so the election will be closed, which means you have to be a Republican to vote. So if someone does need to change their affiliation or needs to register, make sure that it’s done by April 1.”

For more information on voter registration, contact your local county clerk’s office or visit vote.utah.gov.