Monday is last day to register to vote in Nov. 4 election

Monday is the last day to register to vote in the statewide general election on Nov. 4.

Voters can register online with a California driver's license or identification card, according to the Secretary of State's Office. Voters can also mail a registration card postmarked by today to their county elections office as long as it is received before Election Day.

"Registering to vote is one of our most fundamental rights as a citizen," said San Mateo County Chief Elections Officer Mark Church.

As of Sept. 5, more than 17 million California voters had registered to vote out of more than 24 million eligible, or 73 percent of the voting population, according to the secretary of state's office.

That number is marginally higher than the percentage of voters registered in the November 2010 election and nearly 4 percentage points higher than those registered to vote in the 2006 general election.

Democrats outnumber Republicans nearly 2-to-1 in this election, according to the secretary of state's office, with Democratic voters representing 43 percent of the voting population, compared to 28 percent for Republicans.

The number of voters preferring not to state their political preference has increased in recent years. Twenty-three percent of voters declined to state a political preference in this election, compared to 20 percent in 2010, 19 percent in 2006, and 15 percent in 2002.

The statewide election includes contests for the U.S. House of Representatives, eight executive positions -- including governor, attorney general and secretary of state -- the state Senate and Assembly and eight statewide ballot measures.

In order to qualify, voters must be a U.S. citizen, a permanent resident of California and 18 years of age or older on Election Day. People in prison, on parole, or serving a state prison sentence in county jail, along with those found by a court to be mentally incompetent, are not eligible to vote.

People can find out if they are already registered to vote by visiting http://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/registration-status and can register online at http://registertovote.ca.gov.

If enrolled in California's confidential address program, Safe at Home, people should not apply to register to vote online. Instead, they should contact the Safe at Home program toll-free at (877) 322-5227.