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In McHenry County, turnout in Tuesday’s local election has surpassed 2021 and 2023 totals, though it’s still expected that fewer than 1 in 5 registered voters will have cast ballots when they’re all counted.
McHenry County Clerk Joe Tirio said about 6:10 p.m. Tuesday that 16,169 people had cast a ballot on election day. That was on top of the 6,757 people who voted early. His office also had processed 7,725 returned mail ballots.
[ Photos: McHenry County voters cast their ballots ]
The evening tally of 30,651 ballots cast is higher than the 2023 total of 30,475 and 2021’s 22,639 votes.
About 213,230 voters are currently registered in McHenry County, according to the elections page, with turnout being about 14.3% heading into the final hour.
The total number of people on the voter rolls was 237,877 in the 2021 election and 225,772 in 2023.
Odd-year elections tend to see lower turnout than even-number years; a little more than 80% of McHenry County’s then-204,366 registered voters showed up to cast a ballot last November.
Township races, which appeared on the ballot Tuesday, were not on the ballot in 2023, but were up in 2021. In addition to townships, voters chose mayors, school board and hundreds of other positions.
While some school board and other races were hotly contested, several races, including mayor and village presidencies in Algonquin, Woodstock, Lake in the Hills and Richmond were unopposed.
In Woodstock, Mayor Mike Turner was reelected for a second term after running unopposed.
Turner said Woodstock has some “very active” projects going on, including Route 47 widening, working on the Die Cast property and other downtown development, such as a hotel that the city council approved last year.
Turner said Woodstock needs to continue to find ways to get growth, both business and residential.
Other things on the horizon in Woodstock include unfunded mandates; Turner mentioned mandates related to lead pipes, PFAS and phosphorus. “These are substantial requirements” that don’t come with funding, Turner said.
The Metra railyard is another project in Woodstock Turner mentioned, but it differs from the Route 47 in that it’s mostly federal, state and county funded, Turner said. Woodstock has about $16 million in expenses related to the Route 47 widening and the city council approved a plan to pay for it in March.
Lake in the Hills Village President Ray Bogdanowski and Algonquin Village President Debby Sosine also were unopposed, as were the village board seats up this year. Julie Bevel originally filed to run for Algonquin village board, but was dropped from the ballot after not having enough valid signatures.
In Lake in the Hills, Bogdanowski had a challenge from Abhishek (Jay) Gulati, but Gulati was tossed from the ballot after an electoral board found he didn’t have enough valid signatures.
Sosine said the village has been “working diligently” on economic development and there are some projects in the work, but nothing that’s for public knowledge.
Sosine said “Algonquin is a great place” to live, work, eat and visit and wanted to keep the momentum going.
“It’s been a great four years,” Sosine said, adding she was looking forward to four more.
While the election was held on April Fool’s Day, Tirio said he saw something funny from the sheriff’s office but nothing election-related. The sheriff’s office in an April Fool’s prank had announced the launch of a “Donut Patrol;” while they said it was an April Fool’s prank they asked interested people to weigh in in the comments.
Write-in candidates do not appear on the election night result website, and the results of races containing write-ins will not be known Tuesday.
Check out all the results as they come in at shawlocal.com/northwest-herald, and check Wednesday’s print edition for a listing of results, which remain unofficial until the votes are canvassed in about two weeks.