When voters head to the polls on Oct. 7 to decide whether to dump Gov. Gray Davis and pick a replacement, they may face a ballot that is 18 inches long.

Nearly 200 candidates have signed up to run in the recall, ranging from actor Arnold Schwarzenegger to state Sen. Tom McClintock, who represents parts of Santa Barbara County.

"The ballot we use will be a standard ballot, front and back, but we may have to use one which is 18 inches long to accommodate all the names," said Bob Smith, elections division manager for Santa Barbara County.

Santa Barbara County uses an optical scan machine to tabulate ballots, so counting the ballots is not anticipated to be a problem, according to Smith.

The challenge may come when voters finally step in the ballot box, and are confronted with a long list of names.

"It might take people a while to find the

candidate they are looking for," said Smith. "It will probably take them longer in the voting booth."

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That could translate to more voter booths at the 173 balloting centers that will be set up in Santa Barbara County. Although the number of voting places will be the same as in last year's general election, the location has changed in some cases, due to the unavailability of previous polling spots.

Election officials held a lottery-style drawing Monday to determine where the nearly 200 candidates seeking to replace Gov. Gray Davis will appear on the Oct. 7 recall ballot. Under the spotlight of television cameras carrying the event live, officials put printed numbers into film canisters, then placed the canisters into a gold steel-mesh barrel before pulling the numbers out one by one.

For additional fairness, the listing of names on the ballot will be rotated across the state's 80 Assembly districts. The candidate at the top of the ballot in District 1 would go to the end of the ballot in District 2 so that every letter of the alphabet gets the top position somewhere in the state.

The final list of names certified for the ballot is due to be released Wednesday.

Voters will also have the option of voting via absentee ballot, according to Smith. The ballots will be mailed out 29 days before the election. All absentee ballots much be delivered to polling places or received by the county election office no later than 8 p.m. on Election Day.

New voters or those who have recently moved to the county have until Sept. 22 to register to vote in the recall.

The total cost of the election for Santa Barbara County is estimated at $800,000, the amount the elections division is requesting from the County General Fund Contingency. The county Board of Supervisors will vote on the appropriation today.

The last major special election held in Santa Barbara County was in 1998 for the 22nd congressional district after the death of Rep. Walter Capps, D-Santa Barbara. That election cost approximately $500,000 - but was not county-wide and did not have the added financial burden of providing bilingual ballots and poll workers, which will be required in the recall.

Once the election is over, it's unclear how long it will take county and state officials to certify the results and declare a winner from the large field of candidates.

"We have 28 days in which certification has to be done, and we will take however long is needed," said Smith.

Davis will lose if he gets less than 50 percent. With so many challengers on the ballot, the eventual winner could need only a fraction of the vote to become governor.

According to a CNN-USA Today-Gallup poll out Monday, 42 percent of registered voters said there's a good chance they would vote for Schwarzenegger. The poll of 801 registered voters was taken Aug. 7 to 10 and has an error margin of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

Twenty-two percent said there's a good chance they would vote for Bustamante; 64 percent said Davis should be removed from office, including 40 percent of Democrats.

"The big unknown is who will turn out to vote in this election," said John Pitney, government professor at Claremont McKenna College. "How many will vote on the recall question and then freeze when they see this list of over 100 names?"

* Staff writer Jasmine Marshall can be reached at 739-2219, or by e-mail at jmarshall@pulitzer.net. The Associated Press contributed to this story.

Aug. 12, 2003