South Dade Heads Into Its Final Early Voting Day, With Homestead Sites Open and Two Town Elections on the Ballot
Miami-Dade had counted 332,861 ballots by Tuesday evening - a quarter of its registered voters - and South Dade's long ballot, from governor to the Cutler Bay and Palmetto Bay municipal races, closes its early window Sunday at 7 p.m.
The south end of Miami-Dade votes on the same Sunday deadline as everyone else in the county, but its ballot runs longer. Early voting closes Sunday, November 1, at 7 p.m. at all 28 county sites, including the two serving the Homestead area - the Naranja Branch Library on SW 280th Street and the Homestead Community Center on North Krome Avenue - and South Dade voters are deciding more than the headline races, the South Dade News Leader reports.
The county's mid-run snapshot gives the scale. A total of 332,861 ballots had been cast in Miami-Dade as of the evening of Tuesday, October 27, according to turnout figures compiled from county election data - about 25.35 percent of the county's registered voters, split between 185,352 in-person early ballots and 147,509 returned by mail. Those figures, the Leader notes, say nothing about which candidates voters supported; they measure participation, and participation is what the final day adds to.
Below the governor, U.S. Senate, Congress and Legislature races, South Dade ballots carry statewide offices, judicial retention questions and local contests that change by address - including municipal elections in Cutler Bay and Palmetto Bay. The issues the Leader names as the region's live questions - housing affordability, education, transportation, development and the future of public services - are the ones those local races will actually touch, which is why the county publishes official sample ballots: with this many overlapping districts, no two neighborhoods are voting on quite the same list.
After Sunday's 7 p.m. close, South Dade's next chance is Election Day itself, Tuesday, November 3, at each voter's assigned precinct. The early window's whole advantage - any site in the county, including the two Homestead-area locations - expires with it. Voters can check their sample ballot and their Election Day precinct at votemiamidade.gov.
