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Funny numbers
Posted on May 14, 2007 by kraus2686
Filed Under Clinton, Elections, Noah's posts |
Ripples from last Monday’s Clinton Town Election continue to be felt today as some voters and candidates question the accuracy of the results. In short, a printout from Town Hall of the voters who voted in last Monday’s election, obtained by former selectman candidate Greg Stahl, doesn’t match the number of ballots cast. In fact, in three of four precincts there were more ballots cast than voters listed on the printout. What does that mean? It could simply be a clerical error that does not change the election results at all.
As voters check out of the polls, they’re names are checked off a voter list. Those lists are then entered into a computer to create a master list of people in town who voted. The election results are not based on this list, but the total number of people on it should match the number of votes cast, according to Brian McNiff of the Secretary of State’s Election’s Division. In Clinton, the number of people on that list in three of the precincts is less than the number of ballots cast in those precincts. There seems to be only two logical explanations for such a disparity: Either there were people who cast votes that weren’t checked off the lists or as the names were being entered into the computer some names weren’t entered — as many as 34 in one precinct. According to Town Clerk Phil Boyce, this is likely a clerical error where names on the list weren’t properly entered into the computer. By law, the town clerk has 10 days to certify the results, which has not yet been done. By then, these discrepancies may be resolved. With a recount scheduled for one Planning Board seat and two other recounts likely, we’ll hear more on this soon.
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4 Responses to “Funny numbers”
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Noah,
There were only two precincts, which I showed you yesterday, that had more votes than voters listed; Precincts #1 and #3. Precinct #4 vote to voter ratio was perfect, while Precinct #2 had 21 less votes than voters. The total number of votes cast that were greater than the number of voters listed on the paperwork from Town Hall in Precincts 1 and 3 totaled 34.
There are always the ballots that are tallied that a person may have voted for only one person on the whole ballot or may have chosen not to have cast a vote for one or another person on a balot. Many people still believe that they must vote for every slate on a ballot for it to be a valid ballot. My widesire for people is they understand that if in a ballot of twenty races on the ballot that if they only want to vote for one of those races their ballot is still a good ballot. This of course could be a valid reason for more ballots than votes counted.
Greg is correct. According to the printout he has received from Town Hall, there appears to be more ballots than voters in two of the precincts only.
Stephen,
This would explain fewer ballots than voters, but not more ballots than voters, which appears to be the case here.