By Acey Sheehan and Gwen Matthews, October 11, Community News Service

Earlier this fall, most registered voters in Vermont opened their mailboxes to find an election ballot — but how many have been returned so far and from where?

University of Vermont’s Center for Community News, home of Community News Service, has built an interactive map to find out.

Center data visualization engineer Ben Cooley pulled together figures from the Office of the Vermont Secretary of State to track the number and percent of registered voters in each town whose ballots have been received and tallied.

As of Monday October 14, more than 12.91% of those ballots had already been returned and tallied statewide, officials said.

Some towns have more people voting early than others. Middlebury had the highest proportion of returned ballots as of Oct. 10 at 20%, according to the data. South Hero and Guildhall followed with 19% and 18%, respectively, the data shows.

Take a look yourself — click on this link to interact with the graphic below:

Over the next several weeks, the center will be updating the map as new numbers come in. Student journalists with CNS plan to delve into the town-by-town data to tease out trends and provide Vermonters with a deeper understanding of the state’s relatively nascent vote-by-mail system.

In 2021, the Legislature made universal mail-in ballots a permanent part of voting in Vermont. This coming Election Day marks only the second presidential election in which most registered voters in Vermont automatically were mailed a ballot — though some states have been doing it for many years.

Casting ballots via mail is not a new concept. Dating back to the Civil War, U.S. citizens have been able to request an absentee ballot if they’re unable to attend their usual polling location — due to being away for college or military service, for example.

Universal mail-in ballots differ from absentee ballots. They don’t require requests or reasons and are sent automatically to all residents.

In Vermont, the use of universal mail-in ballots spiked during the 2020 election. Officials sent them to voters as an emergency measure to maintain social distancing during the height of the pandemic. 

Almost three-quarters of Vermont votes cast in 2020 came from those ballots, according to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. Only about one in four votes came from people showing up in person.

Whether a vote came by mail or in person that year followed partisan trends. The more people in a town voted for former President Donald Trump over President Joe Biden, the fewer people from that town chose to vote by mail, according to a VTDigger breakdown of state election data. 

Will that trend persist this time around? What about the popularity of mail-in voting overall, a few years removed from the pandemic emergency?

Our reporters will be paying attention to those trends, along with the rate of ballot return in general. We’ll also be looking for patterns involving income, rurality and age.