By HAYLEY HARMON
WATE 6 News Reporter
KNOXVILLE (WATE) - Early voting has officially come to a close. Saturday was the last day for voters to take advantage of it.
In Knox County, the Election Commission told 6 News they were pleasantly surprised at how many people participated this year, since the polls opened on July 13.
The Knox County Election Commission had been hoping for at least 10,000 voters this time around, but at the close of the polls on Friday night, totals had far surpassed expectations, with 11,331 people casting their votes.
"That's out of about 260,000 registered voters in Knox County," said Knox County Election Commissioner Bob Bowman.
Bowman says they'd hoped to see that number go up even more on the last day, saying they expected about 700 more people to vote.
He says it was hard to predict how many people would actually turn out.
"We don't really have a comparable period to compare it to because we've never had a situation where we've had so few uncontested races on a statewide level in Knox County. We currently only have two contested races on the state level," said Bowman.
Some voters at the polling location at the City County Building in Knoxville Saturday said they usually wait until election day, but decided to try out early voting this year.
"It was an opportunity to just get in, vote, and be done," said John Cofer of Knoxville.
Cofer says his experience took a lot less time than it normally does on actual election day.
"This time I wasn't 100% sure I'd be here the time for regular voting is, so I figured, well, I'll go on down here. There are no lines down here, so I decided to go ahead and take advantage of that," said Cofer.
Cofer also say's he likes the convenience of it.
"Knowing it gets done and that you've been able to support your candidates, you know it's nice to have that done," he said.
At the close of the polls Saturday, more than 12,500 people voted early.
Election day is Thursday, August 2nd. Polls will be open all day, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. All voters need to show a photo ID in order to cast a ballot.
