It took less than two hours for eight 2-person teams of King County Elections employees to finish a hand recount of more than 9,200 ballots cast in the Feb. 8 election by Snoqualmie Valley School District voters. At issue is the district’s $56 million bond to build a new middle school.
The department’s Canvassing Board will meet at 2 p.m. Friday to decide on three contested ballots. The voter’s intent is not clear on one ballot. The other two ballots could be counted if the board verifies the voters’ signatures on them. To conceal how those voters filled out their ballots, they will be mixed in with about 600 ballots that have not been examined in the recount.
The recounts final results will then be posted online.
The bond measure lost by a single vote. Within hours of the results being certified, supporters of the bond had raised the $2,650 needed to pay for a hand recount.
Employees pulled and sorted by precinct the 9,980 ballots cast in the election. Ballots were stored in sealed cardboard boxes on shelves in an open room in the basement of the Elections’ building. Each precinct had its own box.
A runner would then deliver a box to a team. The counters would then break the seal and start sorting the ballots — approved, rejected or no vote. Both team members had to confer on each ballot.
“Number one, we’re just checking the accuracy of our results,” checking the automated process, said Katie Gilliam, a spokeswoman for King County Elections.
Filed Under Local News