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There’s a new Board of Elections office in Columbus and the space will be celebrated early next month with an open house.

Citizens can visit the new building, located at 231 Ward Street in Columbus, from 2 to 4:30 p.m. on Monday, February 5. Everyone is invited to stop by and see the new location where one-stop voting will be held. The ribbon cutting will take place at 4 p.m.

The new building for the Board of Elections is known to many residents as the old Red Cross Building. It was recently donated to Steps to HOPE, which then donated the building to the county.

The 6,000-square-foot space has been renovated. Half of the space will be used for offices and voting areas, while the other half is a warehouse where officials can securely store voting machines and election equipment.

All of the equipment will now be in one space, whereas in the past the county had to rent storage space in different parts of the county. The warehouse space will also allow the county room to conduct the vital operations of machine maintenance and testing.

All of the administrative and registration functions will now be run from a single building, and early voting will now take place in this space instead of the Womack Building.

For more information on Polk County’s Board of Elections, visit polknc.gov.