CROWN POINT | Voters have begun to find long lines and waits at Lake County's four early in-person voting centers.

Related story: Lake County early voting hours and locations

The Lake County elections board announced it scheduled a meeting for 3 p.m. Monday to discuss extended voting hours.

That comes after Gary Mayor Rudy Clay asked election officials to keep voting centers open beyond the 4 p.m. closing time after a group of potential voters protested efforts to turn aside a group of voters in Gary at closing time Tuesday.

Nicholas Gasparovic, assistant county elections board director, said 4,600 people already had voted at the Crown Point, Gary, Hammond and East Chicago centers as of Thursday, and early balloting appears to be accelerating as the Nov. 4 election approaches.

Dozens of early voters crowded hallways outside the county elections board in Crown Point on Thursday morning. The line had grown to more than 50 people by mid-afternoon.

"I've waited 30 minutes," Crown Point resident Jennifer Green said.

John Stern, also of Crown Point, who stood at the far end of the line, said, "I'm going to be out of the country on Election Day, so this is very convenient for me."

Diane Schwab, of St. John, said she and her husband traveled to Crown Point in the morning and expected a quick process.

"It took an hour and a half (in line) before we arrived in the office," Schwab said.

Elections board Director Sally LaSota said county officials didn't anticipate the heavy demand and cannot dedicate more machines to the early voting centers without depleting a reserve of 1,080 machines that must be exclusively used at polling places Nov. 4.

"Once machines have been used in the early voting centers, they can't be reused in the polling places," LaSota said.