Utah County had a high voter turnout for the presidential primaries Tuesday, but some officials believe it could have been even higher.

The county had an overall voter turnout of 35 percent, while 40-45 percent of the residents voted in the November 2007 election.

Bryan Thompson, Utah County clerk/auditor, said turnout was much higher than in previous presidential primaries, such as the 2000 presidential primary, which only attracted 10 percent of Utah County voters. However, the voter turnout was lower than the most recent election, which could be because issues in the November municipal election created more interest for Utah voters.

Thompson said there were strong opinions on both sides of the voucher referendum issue, which brought out many residents for the November election. The drop in voters for the election on Tuesday may have been affected by confusion and long lines. The voting precincts in the county were re-aligned last year, and polling places were consolidated from 107 to 59 for the presidential primaries in order to save about $50,000. These two changes confused many people around the valley who found that they did not know where to vote.

Another reason for the drop could have been Mitt Romney's campaign.

"[Turnout] was probably even less because the polls were showing, in Romney's case, that he was pretty much a slam dunk anyway," Thompson said.

Thompson said he personally knew some people who chose not to vote because they thought Romney would win without their help. When the polls closed at 8 p.m., any voters still in line were allowed to vote. While these voters waited, Thompson said some learned Romney had won in Utah and left because they were going to vote for him anyway.

Ron Paul received 3.37 percent of county votes, or 1,820 votes, to come in second, according to the Utah County Web site. Mitt Romney garnered nearly 94 percent of Utah County's votes.

One man said he encountered difficulties with his voter registration and could not vote for the candidate he supported, though that did not deter him from participating in the democratic process.

"I just went to the poll and was intending to vote in the Democratic primary," said Orem resident Peter Van Orman. "When I got there, they said I was registered Republican and had to vote Republican."

Van Orman said he told poll workers he was a registered Democrat and even spoke with supervisors, but they told him there was nothing they could do. The poll book showed he was a Republican, and he could not vote for a Democrat.

After calling the county election office for half an hour and being told the same thing, Van Orman said he gave up and voted with a Republican ballot. The poll workers were doing the best they could, he said, and he wasn't sure at the time whether a mistake had been made.

Once Van Orman had placed his vote, he said he visited the county building to change his registration to the correct party. Officials pulled up his registration and found he was unaffiliated and could vote for a Democrat, but it was too late.

"Once the vote is made in the machine, they really can't do anything about it," he said.

Thompson said he was disappointed poll workers did not call the county clerk's office to verify the registration, but he told Van Orman to file a formal record of the incident. The information will be sent to the Lieutenant Governor's Office to see if there is any recourse.