This was a historic day in our City, State and Country. We prepared for months to make this election, in the midst of COVID-19, as safe as possible for voters.

Our City Clerk’s office issued a record-breaking 127,900 absentee ballots, and virtually all were counted before polls closed.

Turnout as of 6 p.m. was 157,536 or 82.4% of registered voters. This is higher than the turnout in both 2016 and 2012.

Our City Clerk Maribeth Witzel-Behl and her staff of nine deserve huge thanks from the residents of Madison for providing us with a safe and secure election.

This team:

• worked to secure the PPE, hand sanitizers, plexiglass shields, face shields and other equipment,
• scrambled to find larger, safer polling spaces,
• recruited and trained a record number of poll workers-over 5,000,
• created and staffed safe curbside voting options,
• stuffed envelopes and mailed a record number of absentee ballots,
• installed secure drop boxes in 14 locations, and much more.

Their efforts paid off and everything ran smoothly on Election Day, with very few problems at the polls.