DAYTON, Ohio (WDTN) — There are approximately 11 million people in Ohio, and more than three million of them voted in Tuesday’s special election.

The election sparked huge interest statewide, which includes big numbers here in the Miami Valley. The turnout was brisk area-wide, with no county seeing less than 24 percent voter turnout.

Election officials for Montgomery and Greene County say all of the hard work to set up the special election was worth it with so many people coming out to vote.

“It feels great,” Alisha Lampert, Greene County Board of Elections Director, said. “It feels like people were excited about an issue that they felt about either one way or the another. They came out and exercised their voices, so there’s nothing better than that as an election official.”

Officials says they had a target number of voters in mind, but turnout far exceeded those expectations.

“That 38-37 percent turnout is tremendous,” Jeff Rezabek, Montgomery County Board of Elections Director, said. “It really tells everybody that it’s really the issue that drives voters, not necessarily when and what time of the year the election happens.”

Rezabek added the goal for every election is 100 percent voter turnout, but they’re prepared no matter how many people show up to the polls, and with this election they couldn’t have done it alone.

“Poll workers, and I can’t thank them enough for coming out,” Rezabek said. “I think the voters of Montgomery County kind of made their day, it’s tough to sit there if nobody shows up but the lines were out there, and it was very consistent, and our poll workers were happy.”

According to the Montgomery County Board of Elections Office, official results will not be in until Aug. 24.