Absentee voting is now underway for the upcoming May 17 primary election and Clinton County Clerk Nathan Collins has released some important information to persons who plan on casting an absentee ballot.

What you will need to vote by absentee is: name, Social Security number, date of birth, mailing address and reason/excuse.

The legal criteria for being able to vote by absentee ballot include:

* Persons due to age, disability or illness;

* Student temporarily resides out of the county;

* Voters who temporarily reside outside the state (of Kentucky) but who arestill eligible to vote in this state;

* Persons whose employment requires them to be out of the county all hours and/or all days of voting by machine.

Registered voters can obtain an absentee ballot by one of two methods, either visiting their local county clerk’s office, or requesting a ballot online at govoteky.com.

Ballots can be returned either by mail or in person, but only by the voter or a parent/child/spouse of the voter.

Absentee ballots can be requested now through Tuesday, May 3.

Also a reminder, persons changing addresses through Monday, April 18, have to turn in their new address to the county clerk’s office in order to vote in the new precinct in which they now reside.

Meanwhile, no additional non-partisan candidates filed over the past week, leaving the total number of those candidates running for office in November unchanged.

For information about absentee voting, changing voter precincts, registration or general election information, contact the Clinton County Clerk’s Office at 606-387-5943.