'Empty Ovals' Won't Be Counted (on San Diego write-in votes)

[Rose Siding]

the bureaucracy just whipped the democracy's ass...

SAN DIEGO — In a major defeat for write-in mayoral candidate Councilwoman Donna Frye on Monday, a judge refused to order that "empty oval" ballots for Frye be counted, despite a claim that such ballots would give her a victory.

Mayor Dick Murphy leads Frye by 2,205 votes, but her supporters insist there are more than 4,000 ballots for Frye that were not counted because voters did not darken an oval on the line where they wrote her name, as required by state law.

The decision by Superior Court Judge Eric Helgesen may spell the end to one of the city's most improbable candidacies: a write-in effort launched just five weeks before election day by a councilwoman known to many voters primarily as the wife of legendary surfer Skip Frye.
............
Getman said the empty-oval ballots should be counted because voters were clearly signaling their preference by writing in Frye's name even if they left the ovals blank

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-me-sdmayor23nov23,0,6303119.story?coll=la-home-politics

[BlueEyedSon]

1. Thieves.

[Liberty Belle]

2. What about an appeal?

I'm in San Diego, too. I heard the League of Women Voters was considering filing an appeal.

[rjbny62]

3. what a rip off

it is hard to believe that they won't count the votes of people who took the time to actually write in the name of the candidate and would disqualify the ballots because of a missing mark in an empty oval. It is clear that all these voters intended to vote in this way, and they are being disenfranchised because of a technicality. How pathetic.

[pointsoflight]

4. It's not about counting votes anymore.

It's about doing everything you can to not count votes.

[Hobbes199]

5. Definitely a rip-off. But still a gray-scale decision.

They should have filled in the ovals; they should have been educated to do as much during the campaign.

[freedom for all]

6. Whats next?

I guess next time you will say.. you must use #2 pencil, must total fill oval completely & not go outside oval, must do write in candidate with a pen only, must vote on Nov. 3rd, must be counted by repubs only, must not talk about results, must register 10 years in advance if you move to another state, etc... of course this rules only apply to Dems..

If a voters intent can be determinded then it should be counted...

Not in America...

[rinsd]

8. Actually votes on OpticScan are required to be in pen. (NT)

[ParanoidPat]

12. Not necessarily true!

Here in Santa Cruz County we use the Mark-A-Vote, I Mark system of optical scan ballots. If you voted absentee or, as I did, from a 'mail ballot precinct', the instructions were quite clear to "use only a #2 pencil to mark the ballots. If you went to any of the local precincts, you were given a pen to mark your ballots.

The machines used to count the absentee and mail precinct ballots was calibrated to a #2 pencil. The machines used at the polling places were calibrated to a specific type of ink pen.

There are several cases that I'm aware of where ballots with one type of marking were 'inadvertently' run through the wrong scanner to be counted and it was only 'discovered' by analysis of the unusually high number of 'no votes' that showed up in the results. :)

[Eloriel]

7. The will of the voter should prevail - and here it's OBVIOUS

No guessing involved.

[rinsd]

10. Based on the law, what else was available?

The law is pretty clear that only filled out ovals count.

Now voter intent could be an argument but I don't know if there is anything in CA election law allowing for such.

[ParanoidPat]

9. This violates the "spirit and intent" of the HAVA legislation.......

.......an argument can be made that, just as on a voter registration application form, "the darkening of the oval" is redundant in as much as the filling in of a check box was considered to be redundant to the signature attesting to one's citizenship and age requirements being met.

By writing in a candidates name, the voter has clearly expressed a choice of a candidate for that race. The filling in of the oval is only important to the machine interpretation of their intent.

The use of either the right ink or pencil type is also important to the machine interpretation due to the sensitive nature of the optical sensors calibration. In hand recounts, many "lost" votes are usually "found" due to improper marking instruments or mis calibration of the equipment. These votes are added to the count as they should be if the system is honestly biased in favor of each vote counting. :)

If we can find any county in California that counted write in ballots without the oval filled in, we have an 'equal protection' argument.

Just my humble opinion. :evilgrin:

[ourbluenation]

11. APPEAL THIS NOW!

I would - isn't writing in someone's name an indication of a voters intention? This is appealable. Didn't fill in the bubble! What a joke. It's like the woman in florida (and who knows how many others) whose vote was not counted because she didn't mark the tiny bubble that said, in effect, "by filling in this bubble I swear I'm not crazy"

JTT