Montgomery County Board of Elections Director Jeff Rezabek said that a data error caused the column of percentages listed in election results to be miscalculated.
All of the ballot totals listed in the first publishing of final, unofficial results were accurate, so the overall results of contested races and ballot issues were not affected by the error, he said.
But the voter turnout listed in the first set of final, unofficial ballot results was higher than the corrected turnout, going from nearly 50% to 46%.
He and his staff decided to pull the results from the election board’s website due to the inaccuracy and reposted results after counting provisional ballots — roughly 2,200 for this election — and going over write-in candidate data.
A document containing the results was added to the election board’s website at 1:15 a.m. Wednesday.
“We just wanted things to be accurate,” Rezabek said.
No major technical issues were reported at polling locations during voting hours, election officials said.
A mental health incident at the Miamisburg Christian Church polling location caused a delay in the posting of election results online.
Rezabek said he is proud of his staff’s efforts toward the Nov. 7 election.
“It was a great day to get out and vote,” he said. “We did it thanks to the poll workers out there … and we are just thrilled at how our staff performed.”
Election night results are unofficial. County election boards will certify results no later than Nov. 28.
Greene County
Election results for both the Yellow Springs Village Council race and an uncontested Cedar Cliff School Board race were delayed Tuesday evening due to a series of errors by the Greene County Board of Elections going back to the start of early voting.
An original ballot for the Yellow Springs Village Council that should have said “Vote for 3” candidates instead said “Vote for 2.” The error was discovered the day that early voting started, Greene County Elections Director Alisha Lampert said.
The Yellow Springs’ village charter calls for the third-place candidate to serve a two-year term instead of a four-year term. This was the source of the confusion, Lampert said.
Replacement ballots and machines were in place by the third day of early voting. A total of 51 voters were affected. Of those, 24 received new ballots. The rest were contacted and instructed to vote provisionally by the end of Election Day.
Election results for Yellow Springs were posted a little after 3 a.m. Wednesday, showing 67% voter turnout.
Candidate Scott Osterholm said his only complaint was that he wished voters (and candidates) were notified on election night that there would be a delay.
“Some information is better than no information,” Osterholm said. “Other than that, I thought the board of elections handled it well.”
Candidate Gavin DeVore Leonard declined to comment, and other candidates could not be reached for comment.
An error was discovered with an uncontested race for Cedar Cliff School Board, in which a candidate running for an unexpired term was listed as running for a full term, due to “human error,” board member Kim McCarthy said Tuesday.
Board of Education President Matt Sheridan said voters also were given confusing information Tuesday, as the Board of Elections had previously informed the district they would reprogram “only a few” of the voting machines for the uncontested election, but on Election Day, poll workers told voters they could use any machine.
“It’s unfortunate that they knew there was an initial problem weeks ago but did not follow through,” Sheridan said. “Fortunately, our Board of Education candidates were uncontested or else our school district would have to revote.”
Lampert confirmed Wednesday that all of the machines at the Cedarville polling location would have counted towards Cedar Cliff Schools.
“We handled this problem to the best of our abilities and ensured that people were getting to vote the correct ballot,” she said.
Warren County
Warren County hit a few snags Tuesday resulting in delays to report the final, unofficial results.
Elections Director Brian Sleeth said there was an issue in which candidates in small precinct splits, which are divisions within a precinct with multiple jurisdictions, received zero votes, but the software indicated the total as “null,” resulting in the precinct not reporting them at all. Sleeth said elections staff verified that the zero was an actual number to reflect zero votes, and manually reviewed and updated precincts reporting.
Also Tuesday, some extra voting machines were deployed in anticipation of a high voter turnout but went unused. They were inadvertently returned with a valid memory stick, requiring elections officials to check and verify there were truly zero votes cast on those machines.
“We will be going through our procedures and find ways to improve our end-of-night procedures for voting machines not used to prevent future reporting delays,” he said.
Warren County has 171,914 registered voters with 91,126 ballots cast for Tuesday’s general election for a turnout of 53%. There were 16,577 people who voted early and another 7,399 voters who mailed in their ballots. Sleeth said there are at least 1,300 provisional votes remaining to count. The elections board will meet Nov. 20 to review provisional ballots and determine any recounts. The general election will be certified on Nov. 28 by the elections board.
