Warren County voters accustomed to traditional precinct polling places will have to adjust this year, and Warren County Clerk Lynette Yates is taking steps to ease that adjustment.

Yates won approval Monday from Warren Fiscal Court to spend $27,435.99 to produce and mail voter notification cards spelling out how voting in the May primary will be conducted to all Warren County households.

She said the postcards, which are being produced through a contract with Bluegrass Integrated Communications, will be sent this week.

“All voters will get information about when and where they can vote,” Yates said. “They can call us if it’s still unclear.”

What’s clear is that the 2022 primary and general elections will bear little resemblance to elections held before the COVID-19 pandemic forced changes.

While not as heavy on absentee ballots as the reconfigured voting during the pandemic, this election will still be quite a departure from previous years.

Taking advantage of legislation passed last year in the Kentucky General Assembly, Yates has opted to use vote centers instead of the traditional voting precincts. She is also going with the three days of early voting that were approved as an alternative to the three weeks that were used in 2020.

In Warren County, those three days will be May 12, 13 and 14 – the Thursday, Friday and Saturday before Election Day – at five locations: Phil Moore Park, Ephram White Park, Buchanon Park, Living Hope Baptist Church and the county’s Sugar Maple Square property.

Those locations will be open from 8 a.m. until 4:30 p.m. each day and will be able to accommodate any Warren County registered voter.

Yates said voting on Election Day (May 17) will take place at the five early voting locations plus the new Cumberland Trace Elementary School, Warren Central High School and the University of Kentucky cooperative extension building at 5162 Russellville Road. Again, all polling places will be open to any registered voter.

Those eight polling locations, open from 6 a.m. until 6 p.m., will give Yates and her staff a more manageable system than the previous arrangement of 49 locations encompassing 88 precincts.

“For us, logistically, it’s better to go with vote centers,” Yates said in February when she revealed the plan. “The bigger counties are pretty much all going with vote centers. We’re trying to make it easier for the public.”

The voter notification cards aren’t the only mailing planned by the county clerk’s office. Fiscal court on Monday approved Yates’ request to spend another $3,145.92 to mail notifications to voters affected by the redistricting of some House and Senate seats.

While spending money to notify voters of the changes, Yates has also received some funds that will help with the election.

At Monday’s meeting, she was approved for a $202,421 reimbursement for voting equipment purchased in August from Harp Enterprises.

Yates said the reimbursement came from the federal Help America Vote Act that provides funding for improvements to voting systems.

The purchase was the second made by the county to upgrade its voting equipment. Yates in 2020 used a $570,360 grant through the Center for Tech and Civic Life to purchase Verity Scan equipment from Harp Enterprises to replace machines that had been in use for more than a decade.

Yates said the new equipment should make voting more efficient but shouldn’t be a big departure from the equipment voters have been using.

“It will be similar to what we’ve had,” she said. “Voters will use a paper ballot and run it through a scanning machine.

“The machines are a little more compact, and we’ll have devices that improve accessibility for those with disabilities.”

Yates said voters who are eligible can apply for absentee ballots at the govote. ky.gov website. Those unable to apply online can call the county clerk’s office at 270-843-5306.

– Follow business reporter Don Sergent on Twitter @BGDNbusiness or visit bgdailynews.com.