Prince George’s County voters will have plenty of people to choose from in a pair of March 4 special primary elections.

Twelve people had filed paperwork by Friday’s deadline to seek the county executive position and another seven signed up for the vacant County Council District 5 seat.

The winners of those races will face off in a special general election on June 3. Board of Elections Administrator Wendy Honesty-Bey said in a brief interview Monday that the State Board of Elections moved the general election date back a week from the originally scheduled May 27 to allow county election officials and workers more time to process ballots and handle other administrative duties.

At least five high-profile Democrats are seeking the county executive position. They are former County Executive Rushern L. Baker III, State’s Attorney Aisha Braveboy, At-Large County Councilmember Calvin Hawkins, County Council Chair Jolene Ivey and state Sen. Alonzo Washington.

The other four Democratic candidates are Marcellus Crews, Ron Hunt, Albert Slocum and Tonya Sweat. The three Republicans have all sought public office before: George E. McDermott, Jesse Peed and Jonathan White.

The county executive seat became open after the Dec. 2 resignation of former Executive Angela Alsobrooks, who is leaving to be sworn in to a U.S. Senate seat on Jan. 3, after winning the election in November.

The county’s chief administrative officer, Tara H. Jackson, is serving as acting county executive in the interim, but has said she doesn’t plan to seek the position permanently.

Meanwhile, seven people will seek the County Council District 5 seat to represent the area that include the municipalities of Cheverly, Fairmount Heights and Glenarden.

The seat became vacant after Ivey vacated the seat to run for one of the two at-large seats on council, which she won in yet another special election — to fill the seat vacated by former County Councilmember Mel Franklin, who was sentenced Nov. 13 to a year in jail for theft of campaign funds. Ivey won an August primary for the seat, which she won in a special general election.

Six of the candidates for the District 5 seat are registered Democrats – Shayla Adams-Stafford, longtime educator and activist Theresa Mitchell Dudley, Kendal Gray, Ryan Middleton, Kayce Munyeneh and Christopher Wade.

The only Republican in the special election is Fred Price Jr. of Cheverly, a Marine Corps veteran. While that likely assures Price of the nomination, the odds get much steeper for him — and for the winner of the county executive primary — running as a Republican in Prince George’s County, where the vast majority of voters are registered Democrats.

The winners of the county executive and County Council seats will complete the remaining two years left on those terms.

According to the county Board of Elections, early voting for the special primary election will be from Feb. 26 to March 3. Polls will be open from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., but 12-6 p.m. on that Sunday.

Early voting for the special general election will take place May 28 to June 2. Polls will open at the same times as the primary.

Polls on Election Day for the primary and general elections will be open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.

Voters will also be able to place mail-in ballots at drop boxes, but the locations of those have not been announced.

About 5,200 Marylanders are owed a total of more than $6.8 million in unpaid wages, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

Over the last few years, the Department of Labor has “recovered millions” of dollars owed to workers across the country, said Linamarie Martinez, an assistant district director in Maryland.

The money comes from federal investigations and enforcement into workplaces and employers who are not properly paying employees.

Anyone can use the department’s “Workers Owed Wages” or “WOW” tool online to see if the department has money that they’re owed. The tool searches by employer, and then after a worker verifies their name and submits contact information, they can fill out a claim form.

In most cases, a worker will receive a check for earned wages in about six weeks, Martinez said. The money is taxed.

Martinez said that sometimes, when employers are ordered to give back pay, they are unable to find former employees. In those situations, the money sits with the Department of Labor for three years. After that, though, the money is sent to the U.S. Treasury.

That’s why it’s important people check to see if they’re owed anything, Martinez said.

“We have these monies waiting on their behalf,” she said.

In Maryland, there are 5,243 workers owed a total of $6,811,280 in recovered wages. The national labor department’s Wage and Hour Division has recovered more than $1 billion in back wages and damages overall during the Biden administration.

That created “justice and economic relief for more than 615,000 workers,” acting Secretary of Labor Julie Su said in an October statement.