2004 Ballot Recount: Observer Report

• December 14, 2004:
  Report by Green Party Observer

December 14, 2004:
Report by Green Party Observer

The Mahoning County recount started at noon today (Dec. 14 Tues) and ran until 8pm or later. There were three counting stations: two optical scan and one electronic voting. There were three Cobb volunteers and three Badnarik, as well as three Bush and three Kerry. They allowed volunteers to switch in as replacement volunteers. I stayed the whole time as did county coordinator M.

The electronic voting was recounted by putting each cartridge into the computer, bringing up the vote for the precinct and printing it out. After that, the provisional ballots that were counted on election day and done on the touchscreen were recounted by putting the cartridge in and checking the code on the screen with the code on the envelope.

Gloriane Leek, witness for the Democrats, asked that all provisional ballots be re-looked at. She specifically asked to see provisional ballots that were not counted because the person was in the wrong precinct but at the right poll. They let her look at the ballots and she estimates that 50 percent of the provisionals filled out for Mahoning County were not counted because the person was in the wrong precinct but right poll place.

Gloriane Leek asked that those 50 percent be recounted and put in the recount certification. The board decided no. They said it is Ohio state law under the 6th District Court and put forth by the Secretary of State that provisional ballots cast in the wrong precinct are not allowed to be counted and therefore would remain uncounted. Gloriane said she thought the Democrats might file a suit to get the votes counted.

Gloriane Leek also brought up the issue of absentee ballots that were rejected. However, those ballots were not brought out and were not counted in this recount.

Gloriane Leek also raised the issue of distribution of voting machines to precincts. She said precincts in lower income neighborhoods had less machines and not enough machines and therefore longer lines and more voter disenfranchisement. She said the Democrats might file suit under the 14th amendment to deal with this issue. The board said they received new machines for the elections and they gave one new machine to every precinct. They said long lines could not have been avoided.

For Mahoning county, all absentee ballots were done on optical scan as well as provisional ballots filled out at the board on the day of the election. As a sample test for the recount, 600 absentee ballots were selected at random to make up 3 percent. Those 600 were counted by hand and then put through the optical scanner to see if it matched up. For Kerry, there were 7 more votes during the hand count than during the machine count.

Next, the board took all of the absentee and provisional ballots done on optical scan and ran all of them through the machine again. As they were run through, the machine would stop if there were over votes, under votes, or stray marks. Each time this happened, the observers were shown the ballot and everyone would say together (meaning the counters and the observers) whether it should be put in a pile called hand recount or one called over/under votes. Those put in the over/under vote pile were ones that were clearly marked for two or more candidates and under votes were ones that clearly had no markings on them.

At the end of the optical scan machine count, the over/under votes were discarded and the ones in the hand count pile were taken and counted by a woman named Joyce. We all watched. For some of the votes, she could not decide because of stray marks or lightly colored in circles so she made a new pile specifically for the board to look at. She put these votes in an open basket. It was decided that the board would have to look at these votes and determine how they should be counted if at all.

All of the witnesses watched Joyce count. However, the basket to be sent to the board was left untouched, meaning that no one counted or looked at them. We were then told we had to wait about 2 hours for the board to reconvene. When the board reconvened, they handed us spread sheets with the recount numbers on it. Kerry had 109 more votes and Bush had 47. These are vote increases. The board then certified the results and the observers left.

I, along with M., stayed behind and asked what about the votes in the basket marked "must be looked at by the board." They were never looked at. Mike Sciortino the director and one other board member took M. and myself to the room that holds the votes and together we looked at the basket with the ballots that was marked to be looked at by the board. Neither M. nor myself ever touched the ballots.

Sciortino and the board member looked at the ballots, counted 23, and then the board member pointed out which ones he believed would go to Kerry and which would go to Bush.

I asked what their plan was to deal with these ballots that were not counted even though the recount was certified. They said tomorrow the board would reconvene and look at the 23 ballots and redo the results of the recount and re-give us all spreadsheets.

My concern is that for about 2 hours this box was out of the observers site and I do not know for sure that 23 was the number of ballots originally in the box. My concern also is that I was not given a time that the board would look at these ballots and these are highly contested ballots and I think the board might look at them without observers there. Also it is of great concern that if I had not said something these ballots would have been lost.

It should be noted that during the recount and the board meeting one board member was missing the whole time. His name is Robert J. Wasko, a Democrat, who was away on a trip and therefore the board was uneven with 2 Republicans and only one Democrat for the whole of the recount.