By Pamela A. D'Angelo

It took six weeks for Andrea Ullrich to receive her mail-in-ballot. It came the day before the polls opened for the 45 day in-person early voting period.

"I’m 67-years old. I was concerned about the virus and crowding, so a while back because of that concern, I requested an absentee ballot," said Ullrich, who lives in the rural town of Heathsville in the Northern Neck.

By the time early, in-person voting started last week, Ullrich changed her mind about voting by mail.

"There’s so much hype in the media, 'you’re vote’s not safe, the mail’s not safe,' so I wanted to be certain that my vote got counted, so I wanted to do it in person," she said.

She went to her polling place recently. It wasn't crowded and people were masked and physically spaced as they waited.

When it came time for her to vote, the voting machine alerted her she couldn't vote because she received a ballot by mail.

Luckily, she brought her absentee mail-in ballot with her.

"There’s a small process that they had to go through in order to transfer me from absentee to in-person voting," Ullrich said. 

If you forget to bring your absentee ballot, you can still vote by walking into your poll and requesting a provisional ballot, a state elections official said.

But don't try to vote again with your mailed ballot -- that would be a felony.

If you stick with a mail-in ballot, elections officials recommend getting it in the mail as soon as possible so it makes it back to the registrar's office by Nov. 6. 

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