At yesterday's meeting of Northampton County's Elections Commission, Voter Registrar Chris Commini said he was "elated" by a 40.2% turnout in what is usually considered a sleepy municipal race. He has good reason to be pleased, if not also a little tired. Review of previous elections results reveal that turnout in municipal elections has nearly doubled since 2015. In that year, turnout was 21.13%. It increased in 2017 (22.54%) and 2019 (28.05%). This increased to 32.50% in 2021 and 33.18% in 2023. While kitchen table issues are probably the main reason for this increased interest, it's undeniable that mail-in ballots (MIBs), ballot-by demand (called "early voting" by some), and drop boxes have made voting more convenient. Provisional balloting has also played a role in ensuring that votes are counted.
Election day ballots (61,339) still outnumbered MIBs (30,542) by a factor of nearly 2 to 1. In addition, people uncertain of their status are voting provisionally. In this year's race, 343 provisional ballots were counted.
Do drop boxes help increase turnout? According to Commini, 6,400 votes came in from the 7 drop boxes throughout the county. In addition, 457 voters exercised "ballot by demand" at the courthouse and another 44 received MIBs at the Fowler Center.
There are risks to MIBs. If you wait too long to use the post office, you run the risk of having your ballot arrive too late to be counted. You could forget to sign or date the return envelope. But the biggest issue is the problem of "naked ballots." These are ballots from voters who fail to place their MIB in a secrecy envelope to ensure that their vote is private. If a voter makes this mistake, his vote will be automatically invalidated. Elections Solicitor Michael Vargo said ballot sorting machines can sometimes sense that there is no secrecy envelope, and in those cases, attempts are made to contact the voter. But even with this precaution, he said that there are still a "regrettable number" of naked ballots that are only discovered on election day when the envelopes are opened. Those ballots are voided.
How about write-ins? Registrar Commini said there were a staggering number of 9,400 write-ins, but only 593 were legitimate. There were 114 ties, mostly in races for judges of election and other elections workers. Those ties will be decided by a casting of the lots on Friday.
Were there problems with the machines on election day? Commini reported that one precinct in Forks was supplied with an additional voting machine because of long lines. At Gracedale, a machine broke down and a replacement was provided. In a Lower Saucon precinct with three machines, one machine had a broken interior cable, but the judge of elections said he could make do with two. In Lehigh Tp, one precinct experienced a power outage, but machines were able to operate on battery until power was restored.
Two problems occurred before election day. One involved MIBs for Easton's West Ward City Council race. The other concerned the voting machine ballot design for cross-filed candidates.
Easton West Ward's City Council race was between Julie Zando Dennis and Sharbel Koorie. As a result of human error, one voter received the wrong ballot. Commini said he thought this was an "isolated" error but nevertheless took action. He determined that 50 ballots went out to the affected precinct on October 1, the same day wrong ballot was sent. Attempts were made to contact these voters by phone and email. New ballots were sent to these voters as well. 29 voters returned a replacement ballot. 12 voters returned the original ballot. 2 requested to keep original ballot, 3 went to the precinct and voted provisionally or surrendered their ballot to be able to vote on the machine. 4 did not return the ballot or vote in person.
I have previously written about the ballot design on voting machines for cross-filed candidates, who are listed only under one party. This differs from the design on write-in ballots. President Judge Craig Dally has concluded that the ballot design as it appeared on the voting machine is legal, but Commini and Vargo were both questioned about the possibility of making the voting machine ballot identical to what appears on the mail-in ballot, which makes no party differentiation. Both said they would need to discuss this possibility with the voting machine vendor.
Elections Comm'r Scott Hough complained that the county refused to schedule a "special meeting" the day before the election, which Solicitor Vargo told him was logistically impossible. It was, after all, the day before the election. But Hough said that when things go south, as they sometimes do, it is the elections commission that gets scapegoated.
He also found it odd that the elections office refused to allow him and another Commissioner to view the machine ballot on the machine, especially when their signatures are on the ballot. He and other members agreed the elections commission needs to have more than four scheduled meetings a year and should be able to review the ballot before it becomes official.
Before the meeting ended, Commini expressed his thanks to his Deputy, Amy Hess, who has been a steady hand in years of elections. He appreciates his staff, who actually conduct four elections in one cycle (MIBs, ballot by demand, precent voting and satellite offices). He was also grateful to employees in other departments, from maintenance to court administration, as well as retirees.
Though there are bumps in the road in nearly every election, especially municipal races, this was about as good as it gets.
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