Cape Girardeau election officials test ballot counters ahead of - KFVS12 News & Weather Cape Girardeau, Carbondale, Poplar Bluff

While voters in 12 states headed to the polls on Super Tuesday, elections officials in Cape Girardeau continued to get ready for Missouri’s primary just two weeks away.

Allen Seabaugh is the county’s supervisor of elections. He and others spent Tuesday morning testing and verifying their automated ballot counting machines.

“We have to complete that ahead of the election and have two judges one from each party to witness that test and ensure that it’s all being done correctly,” Seabaugh said.

Seabaugh said all 60 of the county’s tabulating machines checked out accurate.

Work to prepare for this year’s presidential primary started eight weeks ago.

It began with getting the names of the presidential candidates from the states that will appear on the ballot, and getting the information to the ballot printer.

“As you get closer to the election there's different deadlines that have to be met," Seabaugh said.

Those include scheduling election judges and making sure all the voting equipment is in place.

"The big issue is just trying to pinpoint what we suspect voter turnout will be," Seabaugh said. "That will affect the number of judges we need at each polling location, the number of booths we need, and just the number of ballots."

Seabaugh said the county is expecting a 32 percent voter turnout for this year's primary. That would be up from the reported eight percent turnout for the presidential primary in 2012.

Missouri and Illinois voters can cast their ballots for the presidential primary on March 15.

Find out where to vote:

• Missouri
• Illinois

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