Secretary of the State Denise Merrill said her office is "more prepared than they ever have been" for election day.
At her annual press briefing before election day, Merrill said her office has learned a lot since the 2010 election, when Bridgeport officials didn't order enough ballots.
"We now have an emergency plan in every town for elections," Merrill said, "and that's something we didn't have four years ago. That's another result of the 2010 election. Every town has an emergency plan that tells you what to do if the electricity goes off, who's in charge, where's the copy room if you need to copy some ballots -- which is, by the way, protocol."
Merrill added that if there are problems, over 100 attorneys from the Connecticut Bar Association have volunteered to be on call should a problem arise.
Merrill said that as of Monday morning, there were 1,959,055 registered voters in Connecticut, including over 31,000 new voters who registered online this year. That number could grow by the time the polls close on election night, now that citizens can register and vote on the same day.
Still, Merrill is expecting a 55 to 60 percent voter turnout, which she said is typical for a gubernatorial election in Connecticut. In 2010, the last gubernatorial election, nearly 57.5 percent of two million active voters turned out.
Merrill also clarified the status of petitioning gubernatorial candidate Joe Visconti, who over the weekend announced that he had dropped out of the race, and threw his support behind Tom Foley. "Regardless of his political statements regarding Mr. Foley, he has told our office that he is not technically withdrawing from the Governor's race," said Merrill. "The ballots are printed and set, and the optical scan voting machines have been programmed. Mr. Visconti's name will stay on all state ballots. Voters can vote for him for governor, and the machines will accept those votes."
More than 90,000 new voters in all have registered in Connecticut since January 1.
Unaffiliated voters remain the largest voting bloc, with 818,389 voters. They are followed by 712,985 registered Democrats and 407,520 registered Republicans.
