6,522 Votes Cast in SPLOST Election

Early voting on Cobb County’s SPLOST special election drew 6,522 voters, according to numbers released Friday evening.

The 1 percent Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax is the only item on the ballot. If passed, it will kick in Jan. 1, 2012, for four years and keep the overall sales tax in Cobb at 6 cents per dollar.

If the referendum fails, the expiration of the current SPLOST on Dec. 31 will result in a total sales tax of 5 percent in the county next year.

The 1-cent tax is expected to generate $492 million over four years to pay for capital improvements across the county, including transportation and parks.

In Powder Springs, $10.68 million in projects are planned. Included are road improvements, facility refurbishing, upgraded police equipment and more. For a complete list of Powder Springs projects, . 

City officials have said that if SPLOST doesn't pass, to fund what they call needed improvements. 

Official figures show that 2,088 people voted from Feb. 21 to March 4 at the county Board of Elections & Registration at the , 3,554 people voted in person this past week at the Board of Elections and five satellite locations, and 880 people submitted mail-in ballots.

The county sent out an additional 220 vote-by-mail ballots, which are due at the Lawrence Street post office by 5 p.m. on Tuesday or the Board of Elections by 7 p.m. on Tuesday. Given that the September 2005 SPLOST referendum passed by 114 votes out of some 40,000 cast, those remaining mail ballots could be important.

The early votes represent about 1.7 percent of Cobb’s 392,589 active registered voters, county spokesman Robert Quigley said.

More than 214,000 people voted in Cobb County in the general election Nov. 2; fewer than 23,000 returned for the runoff four weeks later for three judicial races.

SPLOST supporters and opponents,  Feb. 23, continue to push for every vote. After the weather  last weekend, both sides plan to try again under sunny skies Sunday.

On the opposition side, the Cobb County Taxpayers Association, the Georgia Tea Party, the Cobb Libertarian Party and Americans for Prosperity are sponsoring a Rock the SPLOST rally from 1 to 2 p.m. at Glover Park in Marietta Square, including music by bluegrass band Out of the Blue.

On the support side, the Marietta Daily Journal reports that Citizens for Cobb’s Future will hold its Family Fun Day at Marietta Square from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m.

No early voting is allowed Monday. Polls Tuesday will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

You can check your voter registration status and polling place at Secretary of State Brian Kemp’s website. Cobb offers maps of the polling places here.

Cobb Elections Director Janine Eveler said that tabulating the votes Tuesday will take the same amount of time with the one-issue election as with a full ballot because her office has to get the reports from the same number of polling places, all of which are using electronic machines.

The results will be available on the county government website and on Cobb Channel 23 on Comcast cable television.

In addition to more articles on SPLOST, Patch will have continuing coverage of the voting on Election Day.