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By Mike Bodine
Register Staff
11-6-2008 Local election results are close, really close. They’re so close, in fact, that as of Wednesday morning, most of the races could not be called with confidence.
Such a large number of absentee ballots have yet to be counted that nearly every race is still pending.
Only 80 votes gap the challengers in the hotly contested race for Superior Court Judge, and only three votes separate two candidates for one of the seats on the Lone Pine school board.
An unprecedented amount of absentee ballots, approximately 1,200, along with an equally unexpected 112 provisional ballots, were turned into polling places the night of the election and are delaying a final tally. According to the Inyo County Elections Office, these votes might not be counted until Friday.
Judge candidate Tom Hardy said Wednesday morning with a chuckle, “I’m waiting as patiently as I can.
“I knew it would be close,” he added, explaining that he had spoken to the registrars earlier that morning and he was made aware of the possible delay. “I certainly trust the process, this is what voting is all about – the results are going to be what they’re going to be.”
Hardy explained he had never been in a contest with such a slim margin separating the parties, and said he wished he was in the lead by 83 votes rather than trailing by that many. But, he said he was confident that no matter what the outcome, it would be for the best as both he and opponent, incumbent Brian Lamb, are worthy of the position.
Judge Lamb said Wednesday that this wait was not new to him, as the same scenario was played out six years ago when Lamb first ran for the position. “I’ve been here before.”
Lamb added that this kind of tight race should be expected with two well qualified candidates.
“I’m in no hurry,” Lamb said. At this point, “we step back and be patient and go back to work.”
Another very close race is for one of the two seats up for grabs on the Lone Pine Unified School Board, with incumbent Cathy George at 385 votes, while challenger Le Roy Kritz has 382. Kritz is also closely following Judith Fowler for the Southern Inyo Healthcare District, Zone II, with Kritz at 127 and Fowler at 151.
Fowler said Wednesday that she had been told late on election night by the registrar’s office that she had a “clear victory.”
But, all those absentee and provisional ballots have yet to be counted.
Wednesday morning, county Registrar of Voters Mary Roper explained the official process of counting absentee ballots.
Roper explained that there are about 1,350 votes left to count, 112 of which are provisional ballots.
These absentee ballots are not the absentee ballots that had been turned in early and already counted. The options for absentee ballots are to have them into the registrar’s mailbox by election day, or into the polling place on the day of the election.
Provisional ballots, which are filled out at the polls, can be requested for a variety of reasons. Typically, provisional voters include residents who live in all-mail precincts and didn’t bring in their absentee ballots with them to the polls; voters who were unsure whether or not they were registered to vote yet still wanted to participate; or late registrants.
Roper said the absentee ballots will be counted first. She and her staff will follow with what is called a “voter/non-voter” separation in order to give voting credit to each registered voter.
The time-consuming task of counting provisional ballots is next, Roper explained. She said this process takes so long as each ballot has to be researched to make sure the voter is indeed eligible and that the voter hasn’t already cast votes in another precinct, or by some other means.
If the provisional ballot is deemed valid, then the ballot has to be duplicated onto a real ballot so the vote can be counted.
Then, an election board of four members must be present as the ballots are separated by precinct and election board members from each precinct must be present when the ballots are opened.
She added that the ballots had come from “every polling place in the county” and so it cannot be easily determined if the absentee ballots came from one town or place.
She added that many election board members simply do not have the time to spare to come in the day after a long election night, or they simply have prior commitments. Roper said it had been a “very long weekend” and the elections office was going until 12:30 a.m. Wednesday morning.
Roper added that she did not expect so many provisionals this year, but she said the high turn-out could have been a factor.
An update of election results will be available in the Nov. 8-9, weekend edition of The Inyo Register.
For a complete breakdown of the semi-official election tally, visit www.inyoregister.com.
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