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Candidate Filing For 2016 Elections Begins

North Carolina candidates lined up early to file for the upcoming 2016 elections. Photo credit: Keri Brown

Candidate filing for North Carolina's 2016 elections started Tuesday.

The filing period is two months earlier this year. The General Assembly moved the primaries from next May to March 15 to encourage voter turnout and to give the state a larger role in the presidential primaries.

It will be the first election when voters will be asked to present acceptable photo ID at the polls.

Lamar Joyner, interim Director of the Forsyth County Board of Elections, says people began lining up early at the downtown office in Winston-Salem.

“When you have local races that are going to be on the ballot, you typically have a lot of interest in local candidates getting out early to file,” says Joyner. “We had people as early as fifteen minutes before noon lining up to start filing.”

Next year's ballot also includes races for U.S. Senate, governor and the remainder of the Council of State.

The filing deadline is noon Dec. 21. The State Board of Elections estimates that roughly 2,500 candidates will file before the deadline.

*The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Keri Brown is a multi-award winning reporter and host at 88.5 WFDD. She has been honored with two regional Edward R. Murrow awards for her stories about coal ash, and was named the 2015 radio reporter of the year by the Radio Television Digital News Association of the Carolinas (RTDNAC).Although she covers a variety of topics, her beats are environmental and education reporting.Keri comes to the Triad from West Virginia Public Broadcasting, where she served as the Chief Bureau Reporter for the Northern Panhandle. She produced stories for the state's Public Television and Radio programs and was honored by the West Virginia Associated Press Broadcasters Association for her feature and enterprise reporting.She also served as an adjunct instructor at Wheeling Jesuit University and Bethany College in West Virginia. She worked with the Center for Educational Technologies in Wheeling, WV, and other NASA centers across the country to develop several stories about the use of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) concepts in the classroom.Keri's journalism career began at WTRF-TV 7 in Wheeling. She worked in several roles at the station, including the head assignment editor. She also was a field producer and assignment manager at WPGH-TV Fox 53 in Pittsburgh.Keri is a graduate of Ohio University. When she's not in the studio or working on a story, she enjoys watching college football with her family, cooking, and traveling.Keri is always looking for another great story idea, so please share them with her. You can follow her on Twitter @kerib_news.

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