Advanced voting for Vancouver byelection begins

Wednesday is the first of two advanced voting days in the City of Vancouver's byelection for council and school board.

People cancast their ballot at city halluntil 8 p.m.

During advanced voting only,staff areoffering accessibility aids for people with disabilities, including a sip and puff device, an audio system with headphones to read the ballot, and a magnification device to enlarge the ballot.

There will be another advanced voting day on Oct. 10, before the general voting day on Oct. 14.

The byelectionwas promptedafter former Visioncoun. Geoff Meggs resignedto becomePremier John Horgan'schief of staff.

A month later, the NDP government announced therewould also be an election to replace the school board trustees who werefiredby the previous B.C. Liberal governmentin 2016.

Nine people are running for council, while 19 people are running for the nine school trustee positions.

Voters need two identifying documents to prove they are Vancouver residents, but there are a variety of alternatives available, including swearing adeclaration of identity.

"We don't want to disenfranchise people. We look at the nature of the ID, it's difficult to put everything down ... because there's different pieces of ID," said Janice McKenzie, Vancouver's chief election officer.

A full list of candidatescan be found here.