East Lansing issues include a ballot proposal to amend the city's charter to allow the sale of city property be allowed by a simple majority of voters, as opposed to the current two-thirds majority. Also on the ballot is a provision to decriminalize marijuana in East Lansing, which wouldn't affect it's illegality on MSU's campus, and a state-wide initiative to increase the sales tax from 6 percent to 7 percent.

Voter precincts, however, are almost empty and times where masses of voters usually turn out, usually before and after work and during lunch, simply aren't happening, election volunteer at Precinct 2 (located in the Martin Luther Chapel on Abbot Road) Robert Ulrich said.

He said they recently moved locations, so voter confusion could be part of the problem, and the turnout was only just over 100 by 3:30 p.m.

"I'm not sure if the issues are boring," he said. "This is a pretty solid neighborhood... we usually have a lot more than 127 by this time in the afternoon."

Kathleen Kiester, the precinct chair for Precinct 1 located in IM Sports-West, said only eight people had voted in both her precinct and Precinct 15, which were located in the same room, by 1:30 p.m. 

She said her precinct is normally in Brody Hall, however it was moved because the room is being used as a study lounge during finals week. 

When the polling location was in Brody Hall, she said students would often vote during lunch and that its current location could be too inconvenient for students to travel to. She also said it could be an issue of students not thinking the issues in a local election are important.

"I think students think that 'it's a local election so it's not important,'" she said, adding that local elections have the most impact on the daily lives of students.

Marie Wicks, the East Lansing City Clerk, noted that while student turnout is usually low in an election of this kind, the rainy weather and stress of finals week probably discouraged voters even more.

"I think people will come in after work, or at least I hope they do," Wicks said. "We know that this election is not predicted to have a very good turn out and actually that's surprising to me because people are very passionate about all three of the issues that are on East Lansing’s ballot, so its sort of surprising not to see a little better turnout."

She also reported that between absentee ballots and in-person voting, the rough number of ballots cast so far is about 3,000. 

East Lansing polls will remain open until 8 p.m. on Tuesday.