Voter turn-out soared in Ballarat for last year's local elections, a report published by the Victorian Electoral Commission (VEC) suggests.
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The percentage of people who voted in the ballot, held last October, outstripped previous election years - as well as much of the rest of the state.
The total participation rate for the municipality was more than 83 per cent, the VEC reported in a document submitted to the City of Ballarat earlier this month - higher than the state average of 81 per cent.
Locally, that represents a huge leap from 2016, where the city's highest participation rate was registered in the North ward at 77.7 per cent. It is also a marked increase on the 2012, when voters in the north ward again turned out in most numbers at 79.5 per cent of the total voters' roll.
The elections, which were held under strict COVID restrictions, were an entirely postal ballot across Victoria for the first time - although previous local government polls had also been postal in Ballarat.
According to the voters' roll, there were a total of 84,694 voters registered within the local government area - about five per cent more than in the previous elections in 2016. A total of 73,347 ballot papers were returned.
Of those, there were 66,422 returned ballot paper envelopes by the time the polls physically closed on October 24, with a further 6,925 received by post by the end of the following week.
A total of 2,372 returned ballot paper envelopes were set aside and 153 rejected due to the envelope containing either too many ballot papers or none at all.
The overall informal vote rate in Ballarat stood at 3.21 per cent, compared to the state average of 4.76 per cent.
Candidates were evenly distributed across the three wards in Ballarat, with eight people in each area standing up for election.
There were three successful candidates in each ward, making a total of nine across the municipality.
In 2024, when the next elections are due to take place, there will be a new system in place in the municipality, with one-councillor wards introduced.
There were 25 complaints about the process received by the VEC. Six of them were allegations of a potential breach of the law, although the VEC provided no further details of what each complaint entailed.