Craigen: To ensure your vote is counted use a drop box
By Terry Murry on Thursday, May 14th, 2026 in Columbia Basin News More Top Stories
UMATILLA COUNTY – Umatilla County Elections/Records Supervisor Steve Craigen joins other officials across the state in urging people who haven’t voted yet to take their ballots for the May 19 primary election to drop boxes instead of relying on the U.S. Postal Service. Ballots will be picked up from drop boxes at 8 p.m. Tuesday.
Craigen had good news. As of this past Tuesday, Umatilla County did not have the lowest turnout among Oregon counties, as it has usually had. The county was ranked 25th one week before the deadline.
“Basically, right now we’re sitting at about 12 percent county-wide returned,” he said. “We’ve broken that out and we’re starting now to send out information to our city managers and city mayors.”
Craigen says he’s hoping a friendly metropolitan competition will break out among the cities and towns to continue urging people to vote.
Multnomah County had the worst turnout in the election so far at 8.51 percent. The top five counties on the list are Wallowa County with 21.88 percent, Gilliam County with 21.8 percent, Grant County with 21.63 percent, Wheeler County with 19.53 percent, and Curry County with 18.47 percent.
Other Eastern Oregon counties include (in alphabetical order) Baker County at 22nd, Harney County at 6th, Malheur County at 34th, Morrow County at 15th, and Union County at 14th.
