  The Local Void is one of the nearest large voids, located at a distance of 23
Mpc. It lies largely behind the Galactic Bulge and is therefore extremely
difficult to observe. We use HI 21 cm emission observations from the SARAO
MeerKAT Galactic Plane Survey (SMGPS) to study the Local Void and its
surroundings over the Galactic longitude range 329$^{\circ}< \ell <$
55$^{\circ}$, Galactic latitude $|b| <$ 1.5$^{\circ}$, and redshift $cz <$ 7500
km/s. We have detected 291 galaxies to median rms sensitivity of 0.44 mJy per
beam per 44 km/s channel. We find 17 galaxies deep inside the Void, 96 at the
border of the Void, while the remaining 178 galaxies are in average density
environments. The extent of the Void is ~ 58 Mpc. It is severely under-dense
for the longitude range 350$^{\circ}< \ell <$ 35$^{\circ}$ up to redshift $z <$
4500 km/s. The galaxies in the Void tend to have \HI masses that are lower (by
approximately 0.25 dex) than their average density counterparts. We find
several potential candidates for small groups of galaxies, of which two groups
(with 3 members and 5 members) in the Void show signs of filamentary
substructure within the Void.
