Election Day is eight days away. Here is a list of resources on how to vote and how to decide who to vote for: 

For those who still have not received an absentee ballot by now, DC Board of Elections recommends voting in person at a vote center. Early Vote Centers open Tuesday, Oct. 27. Every ward has at least three centers that’ll operate between the hours of 8:30 a.m. and 7 p.m. Here is where to vote in-person.

Already voted? Track your ballot here. If you see that your ballot is “under review,” it means the elections board is verifying the signature because the one on the ballot does not match the one on file. Sometimes, it means there is no signature on file with which to make a comparison. (More than half of states and D.C. rely on signature matching to verify the identities of individuals who vote by mail—a process one expert described as “witchcraft.”) 

According to the DC Board of Elections, a signature reviewer sends a ballot to a second reviewer if they find a discrepancy. If the second reviewer agrees, then the ballot is sent to management for a final review. And if management confirms the discrepancy, the elections board will notify the voter. The voter will have until Nov. 13 to correct the problem or their vote will not be counted. 

The DC Board of Elections is unable to say how long it takes to handle ballots under review, but assures the public that they are doing so as fast as they can and that the overwhelming majority of ballots are approved under management review. The independent government agency tells the Post just 1 percent of the 76,000 mail-in ballots submitted for the June primary were rejected, mostly due to voters’ signatures. 

Don’t know who to vote for? City Paper staff put together a voter guide on the at-large D.C. Council race. View the voter guide that is broken down by issue here. Of the 24 individuals on the ballot, voters get to vote for two—count em, TWO—candidates.  

The Post’s voter guide has nice visuals of the candidates’ various policy positions, while DCist’s voter guide includes a nice summary of each candidate. Both include candidates’ endorsements. And City Paper already identified one flip-flopper based on candidates’ answers to reporters’ questions: Marcus Goodwin.

Don’t forget 15 candidates are running for the State Board of Education. The Post has a voter guide for that at-large race. City Paper identified some flip-flops in this race too: Chris Martin, who has a complicated position on mayoral control of schools, and Jacque Patterson, who told the teachers’ union he believes police and private security have a role in schools but told a reporter during a recent debate the opposite. You can read all of our elections coverage here.
—Amanda Michelle Gomez (tips? agomez@washingtoncitypaper.com)