Santa Cruz County Clerk Tricia Webber arrived at the government center bright and early at 6 a.m. Tuesday to begin receiving, counting and processing ballots. And she and her team of volunteers and other full-time staff expected to work well into the evening, making for a marathon Election Day.

Webber trained the six new volunteers on-site to receive and sort the ballots by hand. The volunteers are given a stipend for their time. 

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Caly Luna Plowman is a narrative and audio student at UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism on the investigative reporting track. Originally from Los Angeles, she graduated from UC Santa Cruz in 2025....