The only weekend day of advance voting nearly matched the total for the first two weeks of voting for the Democratic and Republican primaries, nonpartisan general election and special elections ahead of the May 22 primary.

A total of 1,499 local voters cast ballots on Saturday, which was within striking distance of the 1,538 total for the first two weeks of voting. In the second week of advance voting, May 7 to May 11, 920 locals cast ballots, up from 618 for the first week of advance voting on April 30 to May 4.

“Last week we had a record week in here. We continued to go up and up as far as numbers,” said Barbara Luth, supervisor of voter registrations and elections for Forsyth County.

For the first two weeks, advance voting was only held at the county’s new elections office at 1201 Sawnee Drive. Hours at the office are 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

No advance voting will be held at Cumming City Hall or the Forsyth County Administration Building as was the case in previous elections.

Starting Saturday and continuing this week, ballots are open at Hampton Park Library, the Midway Park community building and the Sharon Springs Park community building.

For those three sites, hours for the final week of advance voting will depend on the day.

Polls will be open that week 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Monday, Wednesday and Friday and 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Tuesday and Thursday.

For Saturday voting, 1,064 of the day’s 1,499 voters voted at Sharon Springs Park, which Luth attributed to voters living in the area being able to vote on the proposed city of Sharon Springs.

“On Saturday, naturally Sharon Springs was the big place,” she said. “We didn’t have any problems. We didn’t have any issues.”

Luth said the only questions poll workers have been asked about the city is from those who can’t vote on it.

“The one thing people do want to know is why people in the county can’t vote on Sharon Springs, but …  that is what the legislature set, so we can’t do anything about that,” she said.

Advance voting will wrap up on Friday, which is also the last day to submit applications for absentee mail-in ballots. No advance voting will be held on Monday.

In the primaries, voters will be able to decide their party’s candidates for seats at the county, state and federal levels for the Nov. 6 election. Voters in the Democratic primary will also answer six questions from the local party.

All voters will also vote on a $295,000,000 Forsyth County Board of Education bond issue.