MONROE — When Monroe City Clerk Arianna Voegeli said she expected a high voter turnout after the August primary, she made an accurate prediction. 

On Tuesday, residents showed up at City Hall in numbers nearly at the totals from the 2016 presidential election. In total, 4,449 ballots were cast in Monroe during the midterm to decide county and state positions. In 2016, the fall general election brought in a few more to determine the race between then candidate Donald Trump and the former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. There were 4,970 votes in the city that year.

The county and city followed a nationwide trend of higher voter turnout. In Green County, 17,193 voters cast ballots, up nearly 2,000 votes from the fall general election in 2014, when Gov. Scott Walker ran for re-election against Democratic challenger Mary Burke. The county total was the highest in 2016 at 19,115 votes.

Election day for the City of Monroe started off slightly on the wrong foot as a voting tabulation machine was knocked over, causing a small panic before everything was corrected. But when the voting began, City Hall buzzed, bringing in just over 2,000 voters by 10 a.m. By 1 p.m., the numbers exceeded 2,500 votes. A handful of people were still filing in as the clock ticked close to 8 p.m. 

Recent rewiring work at City Hall caused a small headache at the county clerk’s office when Monroe notified officials that they may have been unable to send results electronically. However, the numbers were eventually finalized as Monroe and the rest of the county municipalities, Decatur and Belleville also stragglers, submitted their tallies.