Pinellas County Votes Tuesday Too: Polls Open 7 to 7, and a Mail Ballot Belongs at an Elections Office, Not a Polling Place
Early voting closed Sunday night on the Pinellas side of the bay as well. What is left for Pinellas voters is the same narrow pair of doors as in Hillsborough - your own precinct on Tuesday, or a mail ballot delivered to a Supervisor of Elections office by 7 p.m. Tuesday - but the offices, precincts and ballot are Pinellas County's own.
Pinellas County's early voting is finished. The early-voting locations that ran from October 19 closed on Sunday, November 1, and the county's Supervisor of Elections now turns to Election Day itself: Tuesday, November 3, when polls across Pinellas are open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. As on the Hillsborough side of the bay, there is no voting just anywhere on Tuesday - a Pinellas voter must vote at the polling place assigned to their precinct, and VotePinellas.gov carries the county's precinct and polling-place lookup, along with live turnout data for the general election.
A mail ballot still sitting on a Pinellas kitchen table has its own strict route, and the county states it plainly: the ballot must be in the hands of a Supervisor of Elections office no later than 7 p.m. on Election Day to count, and it cannot be turned in at an Election Day polling place. Pinellas voters return ballots at the county's Supervisor of Elections offices, whose locations and hours are listed at VotePinellas.gov - and Monday, November 2 is a delivery day only: no in-person voting takes place anywhere in the county on Monday, while the county Canvassing Board meets ahead of Tuesday.
A voter who would rather vote in person after all has one clean option: bring the mail ballot to their precinct on Tuesday, surrender it, and vote a regular ballot there. What does not work is mailing the ballot now and hoping - a ballot that arrives after 7 p.m. Tuesday does not count, whichever side of the bay it was cast on.
