Recount for SLO County supervisor race just ended early. Here’s why
A manual recount for the San Luis Obispo Board of Supervisors District 2 race came to an abrupt halt on Thursday morning after election staff tallied about 20% of the ballots.
This means that the original election results — which show that incumbent Supervisor Bruce Gibson defeated Dr. Bruce Jones for the seat by just 13 votes —still stand.
San Miguel resident Darcia Stebbens requested the recount on behalf of Jones’ campaign.
The District 2 recount lasted seven days and cost about $45,975, according to San Luis Obispo County Clerk-Recorder Elaina Cano.
On Wednesday, election staff counted six of the 29 precincts in District 2, and the new count was identical to the original tally — except for one extra ballot that observers discovered and added to the tally.
“Everything seems to be spot on, and I think had we have kept going it would have continued to be that way,” Cano said Thursday.
Recount for SLO County supervisors race ends
Before 9 a.m. Thursday, Stebbens directed Cano via email to end the recount.
Stebbens then failed to deliver a check to San Luis Obispo County covering the day’s recount costs by 9 a.m. Thursday, causing Cano to officially terminate the recount, the elections official said.
Gibson will be sworn into office at 9 a.m. Tuesday, along with Jimmy Paulding, who will represent District 4 on the board, and Dawn Ortiz-Legg, who will represent District 3.
Paulding and Ortiz-Legg won their respective positions during the June primary.
Stebbens also requested a recount for the District 4 supervisors race, which lasted 18 days and cost more than $53,000. The recount showed that the District 4 election results were 100% accurate.
With the District 2 recount officially over, Stebbens cannot ask the county to resume recount efforts.
After requesting recounts for the District 2 and District 4 supervisor races, the SLO County Citizens Action Team, led by Stebbens, still expressed skepticism about the integrity of the election process.
Cano, however, defended the California election system.
“I do think it is secure, and I think it is trustworthy,” Cano said.
Why did group halt District 2 recount?
Why did Stebbens and the SLO County Citizens Action Team decide to end the recount?
In general, Stebbens and the SLO County Citizens Action Team allege that citizens can not properly audit the California election system because it is “not designed to be accountable,” the group said in a news release Thursday.
The group’s first concern is that the election process is based on an “honor system,” alleging that the state and county do not effectively verify a voter’s identity before they cast a ballot.
For example, voters don’t have to provide photo identification at the polls, and mail-in ballots are sent to every registered voter’s address on record without confirming that the voter still lives there, the group said in the release.
SLO County Citizens Action Team also said that the vote-by-mail system “has virtually eliminated the checks of the traditional precinct voting system of neighbors running polling places who can identify neighbors voting in person.”
“All of these practices, working together, picture a system without any effective checks or deterrents to prevent abuses,” the group said in the release.
Cano, however, said that California law created “checks and balances to ensure that that voter is exactly who they say they are.”
For example, first-time federal voters must provide ID to vote at the polls — though staff do not need to verify the signature of poll voters when they sign in to vote at the precinct, Cano said.
The verification process is even more extensive for mail-in ballots. A voter must sign the back of their ballot’s envelope, and election staff then compare the signature to the voter’s records, according to Cano.
“They are required to provide us with their signature under penalty of perjury,” Cano said. “I wouldn’t be able to sign your name the same way that you would.”
If the signature on the ballot doesn’t match the voter’s records, then the county asks the voter to cure their signature. If the voter neglects to cure their signature, their ballot isn’t counted, Cano said.
The group is also concerned about the voter rolls, saying that the state or county “cannot provide a clean list” of voters who are entitled to vote or people who actually voted, or “a list of total ballots sent out that matches the number of voters on the voting rolls at the time the ballots are mailed out.”
Cano explained that when an individual requests a copy of voter data — such as who is registered to vote and where they live — the requester receives a copy of voter information from that day.
“That changes on a moment-to-moment basis,” Cano said. “People go to the DMV, they re-register, they’ve moved.”
As a result, the voter data may be out of date by the time the requester receives the documents, Cano said.
Candidates react to recount news
When asked about recount efforts, Gibson said that it’s damaging to democracy to make claims about a “lack of integrity” in the election process without evidence.
“Those ideas coming forth from this local group are, to me, simply parroting a national effort to attack our most sacred part of our democratic process — which is free and fair elections,” Gibson said.
The supervisor called the end of the recount “a victory for local democracy.”
“This crucial part of our democratic process in this county did what it was supposed to do — which is turn out a fair and accurate election revealing the voice of the people,” Gibson said. “The fact that they don’t have any evidence that there is any compromise to our voting system is really good news.”
In an opinion piece for Cal Coast News, Jones acknowledged that Cano had certified the results for the District 2 election showing that Gibson received 13 more votes than he did, and that the recount had ended.
“I want to thank all the people who contributed to my campaign with their time, money and effort,” Jones wrote. “I also want to thank the people in District 2 who voted for me and the people who tried to vote for me on Nov. 8 in person at their precincts but were disenfranchised from voting the way they wanted to vote.”
Jones pledged to “continue to champion fiscally responsible, corruption-free county government.”
This story was originally published December 29, 2022 at 1:12 PM.
