Wood Commission canvases election results, no races were changed
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PARKERSBURG - As no races would be affected, the Wood County Commission set out Monday to canvas the results from last Tuesday's election and make sure every eligible vote was counted and added to the totals.
The Wood County Commission met as the canvassing board at the Wood County Courthouse to review 113 provisional ballots, from early voting, election night and absentee ballots, to determine which ones would be counted and which ones would not.
Commissioners also handpicked, at random, three voting precincts that would be hand counted. Those were 38, 63B and 46.
"Every election is held on a Tuesday and the following Monday we begin the canvassing of the ballots," Wood County Commission President Blair Couch said. "We want to verify the machine totals equal the paper ballots.
"People forget that we don't just count the machine totals, we count the ballots."
Each of the selected precincts have four people, Republican and Democrat, who do a hand count.
"They have to be within 1% of the machine total," Couch said.
Teams were counting throughout the day on Monday. Couch said two of the precincts were smaller and the third was a larger precinct.
Of the provisional ballots, 70 were approved, counted and added to the totals. Those included 18 that were postmarked by Election Day, four absentee provisional ballots and 48 approved provisional ballots from Election Day.
"No race will be affected by this," Couch said, adding the commission was making sure that every eligible ballot was counted.
With the provisional ballots, commissioners looked at whether the voter's registration had been cancelled for having no activity over the last two federal election cycles which would have caused a ballot to be rejected.
"We have to keep the voter rolls up to date," Couch said.
Officials urge voters who haven't voted in a while to check their voting registration status.
Other reasons for a ballot to be rejected included providing no ID when they went to the polls to vote, not registered to vote in Wood County, being registered in another county, being a felon when their right to vote had not been reinstated and more.
Reasons where it counted included having moved and they were now voting in the right precinct where the resident was able to prove their new address; the ballot type was the same with no differing races, a poll worker error and more.
"The County Clerk's employees investigate it and bring it to us where we determine if we sustain the challenge where we won't count it or overrule the challenge and count it," Couch said. "This is the first election in my memory where we didn't have a poll worker voting out of precinct."
The county consolidated eight precinct voting locations this election which meant they didn't need as many poll workers.
"We don't want to disenfranchise voters," Couch said.
Wood County Clerk Joe Gonzales said they put up signs at the old voting locations, like Criss School, to inform voters where the new locations were, including the new City Park Pavilion. The clerk's office also sent out post cards telling people where their new voting location was.
"We had several people thank us and tell us the new locations were much better," he said. "They really thought those worked out really well with easy access in and out.
"Everything really ran smoothly."
The hand count was still proceeding at 3 p.m. Monday. Once completed the county commission will certify the results as the official total and send those to the West Virginia Secretary of State's Office.
Gonzales said once the hand count is done and the results approved, he believes the revised totals as well as the precinct by precinct count could be available on the county's website by the end of the week.
"There will be a lot of people interested in the precinct by precinct turnout," Couch said.