The preparation for the final canvas of votes on November 18 is already beginning.  Here are some of the things that will be happening.

First, election judges from each party will pick up absentee ballots from our P.O. Box Thursday, November 6, Monday, November 10, and Tuesday November 18.  On each day, the judges will validate that the absentees were signed by the voter.  The ballots that are picked up on November 6 and 10 will be sealed in a case until November 18.

On Monday, the judges will also begin the process of handling the Federal Write In votes.  These are votes cast on a blank ballot of sorts by Overseas Citizens and Military Personnel.  They can be returned to us by qualified voters if they don’t receive their ballot in the mail.  In some instances, the Federal Write In vote is not cast because the voter will have followed up the write in ballot with an actual ballot.  For any write in votes that are to be cast, a regular ballot will have to be remade by two judges that reflects the intent of the voter.

In the next 10 days, our office will be validating the provisional ballots.  We’ll investigate each provisional ballot and determine whether the ballot should be counted.   By using their unique number of their provisional ballot receipt, a voter may check the status of their provisional vote by going to our website or calling our office to determine their provisional vote outcome.  The Help America Vote Act requires that the provisional voters be kept confidential.

On Tuesday, November 18 at our office the judges will validate the final late arriving absentees.  They will then pull any Federal Write In ballots that are not to be counted.

After the validation is complete, the judges and staff will proceed to opening up the envelopes for the validated absentee and provisional ballots.  We will open up twelve tabulators, just as we have here in the absentee center.  The tabulators will have zero results on them. The ballots will be inserted into those tabulators.  After all the ballots are inserted, the twelve tabulator cards will be inserted into the PC that accumulates election totals and a final result will be announced.  Results will be posted immediately on the web.

People are invited to attend the canvas.  Hopefully the process will take less than three hours, but it’s hard to know for sure.

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