Workers spend day counting ballots, not votes  (FL)

ANDREW ABRAMSON     Palm Beach Post 04 September 2008

WEST PALM BEACH — More than 30 workers today were sifting through thousands of ballots at the tabulation center off Belvedere Road, desperate to come closer to a conclusion in the race between Circuit Judge Richard Wennet and challenger William Abramson.

But unlike last week, the workers weren't recounting votes in the controversial race. This time around, they were merely counting the number of ballots.
When the votes were initially counted after the Aug. 26 primary, Abramson was ahead by 17 votes out of 102,523 ballots cast.

However, Wennet was declared the winner by 60 votes following last weekend's recount, but only 99,045 ballots were counted.

While county election staffers said early this morning they recovered 2,700 or the 3,478 missing ballots, the discrepancy is still enough to warrant recounting all the ballots.

About 30 workers in groups of twos were unloading large gray plastic boxes full of ballots from the primary.

They had until 5 p.m. today to finish the tally. The county canvassing board will meet then and decide what to do next.

"Was that 329?" one worker said to another. "Yep, 329," the other responded.

One woman dipped her fingers in a tin of wax.

"Even the ones that are already banded, you can flip the pages this way."

Once each box was counted, the workers would take a quick snack break while officials came over to verify the number of counted ballots.

If the ballots match the 102,523 from the initial primary, another recount is expected to be ordered.

"If we don't have 102,000 or damn close to it - I'm not sure what that means, whether it's within one ballot, 10 ballots, I don't know - then at 5 o'clock we will tell the state ... and they will probably not accept the numbers if they don't add up and the two candidates will go to court," said county commissioner Mary McCarty, who is on the canvassing board.

If the race does wind up in court, McCarty believes a judge will have several options — declare Abramson the winner based on the initial tally, declare Wennet the winner based on the recount or order the two candidates to run again in November.

A fourth, but unlikely option, would be for the judge to count the votes and declare a winner.