Albertans line up for first day of advance voting before Oct. 19 referendum

Less than a week out from a referendum on separation, advance polls have opened. Voters now casting their ballots. I can't even believe we're here, but we are, and so let's do it. Albertans being asked if they want the province to remain in Canada or start the process to hold a second binding referendum on independence. I feel that Alberta has been forgotten. I think we should be given the chance to say how we want to be governed. To me, I want to stay in Canada because if we're independent, how long would it be until the U.S. would take us over? You know, everyone has the right to bring up that question. I think it's fair to let the population vote on it. Separatism isn't the only issue. Voters also being asked five questions about immigration and four about Canada's constitution. Some of the questions I just had to read over a couple of times to see what they were actually saying. The questions are definitely complicated, and I think anybody who might be ESL, they're certainly not written at an easy-to-understand level, that's for sure. Each question on its own ballot. All of that will be a challenge, says a former Alberta electoral officer. I'm anticipating there will be lineups, there will be problems at the poll. It's a much more complicated process when you're involving 10 ballots, 10 ballot boxes. The expectation? Millions of pieces of paper that will need to be hand-counted. Elections Alberta, aiming for 60,000 election workers, roughly 46,000 have been hired. We will be able to run this event with the people that we have, but that being said, we can always have more people. The counting may take a little longer than they had hoped it would take, if in fact that's where the shortage of workers ends up being. Ballots addressing the separatism issue will be counted first when polls close Monday. But unofficial results could take up to 48 hours after that. Julia Wong, CBC News, Edmonton.