DeKalb County will resume a hand count of ballots in a County Commission race Monday after technical problems thwarted a machine tally.
Election officials must count votes from 40 precincts by hand to determine the winner of the District 2 commission race in the Democratic primary.
County attorney Viviane Ernstes announced the hand count at the DeKalb election office on Sunday, and the count began in the afternoon. She said the Secretary of State’s Office had agreed the hand count is the best way to proceed because of a slew of technical problems with the machine tally.
Programming errors made the initial results inaccurate and continued to plague the process when the recount began Saturday.
Three candidates are vying for the Democratic nomination for District 2. Initial results showed none of them had enough votes to avoid a runoff election.
Credit: Miguel Martinez
Credit: Miguel Martinez
The initial tally showed outgoing DeKalb school board member Marshall Orson finished in first place, followed by local consultant and activist Lauren Alexander and nonprofit consultant and former ethics board member Michelle Long Spears.
But Spears asked for a hand count, citing apparent problems with the initial results. Many polling places reported that Spears received no votes on election day — even the precinct where she voted for herself.
Credit: Miguel Martinez
Credit: Miguel Martinez
The Secretary of State’s Office said the problem was caused by programming changes to voting equipment when a fourth candidate withdrew and was removed from the ballot. Technical problems continued to plague a planned machine recount of ballots on Saturday.
Credit: Jenni Girtman
Credit: Jenni Girtman
Under Georgia’s voting system, each ballot is printed from a touchscreen voting machine. Election officials say they can count the paper ballots to get an accurate tally.
The DeKalb County Board of Elections is scheduled to certify the results on Tuesday.
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