Wisconsin SC Recount: Waupaca County Discovers Canvass Error

[deminks]

http://gab.wi.gov/node/1835

Waupaca County officials have discovered two errors in the original canvass of the Supreme Court election. Here is Waupaca County Clerk Mary Robbins' explanation to G.A.B. staff:

Town of Larrabee – discrepancy in count. I have attached our recount notes in regards to the Town of Larrabee. They use both the Edge machine and the Optech Eagle. The Town of Larrabee original tally sheet from the April 5, 2011 election showed a 0 vote count on the Eagle on their tally sheet. (minutes attached) Board of Canvass did not think they could open the ballot bag to count at their April 7th Board of Canvass, we should have done that. The clerk was called (Arlene Kratzke) and she said she just forgot to transfer the numbers onto the sheet. The Board of Canvass should have caught this mistake the tape was attached and I apologize, we must have just read the sheet and didn’t check the tapes, we normally always check the tapes. The call in sheet, also, only shows 70 for Kloppenburg, the tape shows 167, the actual hand count shows 168 for Kloppenburg.


Town of Royalton - discrepancy in count, Kloppenburg original count was 80, Recount final count was 95 votes for Kloppenburg. They use the Edge machine and paper ballots: Original Tally was 80 votes, the Edge machine tape showed 40 ballots, that total matched the tape, they counted the Edge tape 3 times. The hand counted paper ballots were 40 on the original tally sheet (I think they just put 40 in both columns by mistake) Tabulators, counted 3 times for Kloppenburg. The 15 ballots were paper ballots, the recount team counted these ballots 3 times. Clerk had no explanation other than the election officials forgot to count a stack of ballots cast for Kloppenburg when they reported and put all paper ballots into the bag or the person writing the tallies just copied the 40 twice. Since these were paper ballots a recount is the only way these would have been found.

[HopeHoops]

1. That paints a rather ugly picture.

(groan) - sorry.

[elocs]

2. Even if we had elections that used paper ballots that were hand counted

if you have morons or incompetents or outright crooks doing the counting it will be screwed up and wrong. When you have poll workers and county clerks who treat paper ballots as casually as junk mail instead of being important and precious then the foundation of our voting process is built on sand.

Over the years that I have voted I have seen great people working at the polls, but I have also seen people there who seemed so clueless that I wouldn't trust them to look after a dog I liked.