LANSING - Voting may take a tad bit longer for the upcoming elections due to the recently passed straight party ticket voting law.

"Up until January of 2016, Michigan was a handful of states in the United States that allowed straight ticket party voting. What that means is in a general election a voter can go into their voting booth and when they have their ballot, they simply mark whatever party they want to vote for and if they wanted to vote all Democratic party..they would mark Democratic party on the straight ticket and it means all the open positions that were partisan would be voted Democratic and the same thing if somebody voted Republican," Township Clerk Brett Dreyfus stated.

In January 2016, the state legislature alongside Governor Rick Snyder abolished straight party ticket voting in the state of Michigan.

"Currently there is only 9 states in the United States that allow straight ticket voting, 41 have abolished it and it's been a trend over the last few years to basically eliminate straight ticket party voting," Dreyfus mentioned.

So what does this mean for voters?

"The end result of this is that voters have to go through each particular candidate position that's available and vote for each one individually," Dreyfus noted.

Many individuals feel that eliminating straight party ticket voting will lead to longer wait times and longer lines when voters wait their turn to enter the voting booths. However, some feel there is a positive side to this as well.

"The positive side in theory is that in a democracy, we want an informed electorate, we want citizens that take the time to look at individual candidates for each particular position and take the time to know is this really who I want for this particular position," said Clerk Dreyfus.

Dreyfus mentioned that the elimination of straight party ticket voting will not affect the presidential primary coming up nor will it affect the primary in August. He said that this will only affect the general election in November when opposite political parties run against one another.

With all that being said, there was talk regarding an absentee voting bill as well.

"The reason that it was brought up about absentee voting was to try to encourage people to vote absentee so if they had to take more time to go through the ballot now that theres not straight party ticket voting, that if they do it at home it would mitigate or ease some of the concerns about the extra time because more people are voting at home," Dreyfus stated.

This so-called absentee voting bill failed and there is still one question that remains…

"How will it affect the length of time it takes to go through the voting process and will it cause longer lines?" Dreyfus stated inquisitively.

The answer to that question…is yet to be determined.