SALINA -The Saline County Clerk’s office has released the unofficial results from the special sales tax vote that closed at noon today.

According to Saline County Clerk Don Merriman, 11,566 ballots were cast in the election. Of those, 6,216 voted in favor of the sales tax increase, while 5,350 voted against it. Ballots were mailed to 28,638 registered voters that live within the Salina city limits.

Merriman tells The Salina Post that he didn’t have an exact number of how many ballots were invalid due to signature and address issues. “It was a rather large number, unfortunately,” he said. He estimates that around 5,000 ballots had bad addresses.

The passage of the new sales tax increase repeals the current 0.4% special sales tax and increases it for businesses in Salina to 0.75%. The overall sales tax will increase from 8.40% to 8.75% effective October 1st.

The Salina City Commission previously committed the $9.35 million the special tax is anticipated to raise each year for neighborhood street improvements, property tax stabilization, parks, job creation, capital improvements, neighborhood revitalization and the old Smoky Hill River channel cleanup.

The election results will be canvassed at 9 a.m. Monday in Room 209 of the City-County Building.