SJC Board of Canvassers note ballot issues in several townships

Issues don’t appear to have altered results

The St. Joseph County Board of Canvassers (BOC) serves to certify all elections taking place within the county, inspect ballot boxes and verify that ballot counts match the rolls showing how many people voted, and, when necessary, to conduct recounts. It served in this capacity during and following the Michigan Primary Election this past August 4.

For election certification, there is a procedure. When polls close on election night, votes are tabulated at, and reported from, each precinct. Once counting and reporting is complete, the ballots are placed into containers. The containers each receive a seal, certified with election officials’ signatures, before they are transported to the BOC. Once it has all of the containers and associated documents, such as vote counts and voter lists, the BOC can convene to inspect the containers, ballots, and documents, before it can then certify the election results.

This week, Watershed Voice heard from several readers who reported rumors were circulating that in some townships, up to two-thirds of absentee ballots had been tossed without being counted. After an inquiry to her office, County Clerk Lindsay Oswald, who serves on the BOC, provided the minutes of the August 6 BOC meeting, when its members reviewed the sealed ballot boxes that the townships submitted.

In its August 6 minutes, the BOC noted issues in several townships, none of which appear to have altered results. Several had to do with the transfer containers that carry ballots from one place to another. 

For Burr Oak Township, the container certificate was not attached to the ballot transfer container. Colon Township’s container did not have a seal number, and the voter list was excluded from the poll book. However, the Township Clerk brought a USB drive containing the voter list, which Oswald printed. 

As with that document, some other townships’ issues related to documents and paperwork. In Fawn River Township’s canvass paperwork, the Statement of Votes did not include a signature to verify the seal numbers on the ballot and transfer containers. For Flowerfield Township, the election inspector’s Completion Certificate was not completed in the poll book. 

Leonidas Township’s Ballot Summary was not balanced, and the List of Voters was incorrect. There were absentee ballots recorded in both the poll book voter list and the absentee voter list. The BOC minutes say, “the out of balance error is expected to be a missing av voter from the voter list.”

Lockport Township’s canvasser envelope did not include a totals tape. For its Absentee Voter Counting Board, the voter list was incorrect. According to the BOC minutes, “there was not a clear indication of which voter’s ballots were processed because of the many notes and highlighting.” 

There was also an issue with Lockport’s crossover ballots, in which voters cast ballots for a party with which they are not affiliated. Rather than being tabulated through the tabulator, these ballots were spoiled. However, because there were no non-partisan or proposal votes on the ballot, those ballots would not have affected or changed the final results.

In Mottville Township, the tabulator was out of balance by a single vote, which the BOC minutes said was likely due to an absentee voter ballot which was returned, but which did not get added to the voter list. For Nottawa Township’s Absentee Voter Counting Board, the seal section of the Statement of Votes did not include a Republican’s signature.

The Fabius Township report in the minutes was more extensive than the others. According to that section, the write-in votes for the Democratic precinct delegates had not been counted at the close of the polls. To attempt a correction of that error, with the Clerk, the BOC requested the ballot container be brought in to evaluate the number of valid write-in votes. 

BOC members determined that it was not a certified ballot container. They broke the container’s seal, counted the ballots, and found that the 1,100 ballots contained matched the number of voters and tabulated ballots indicated in the associated documents. Following that, they inspected the container, voted to certify it, and resealed it with a new seal number.

Other townships were not included in the minutes, which Oswald said was because the BOC did not find any issues with their ballots or associated materials. Villages and cities are not included in the BOC’s reporting. For all of the townships, the BOC certified the full election results the day after its meeting, August 7, 2020. 

The BOC’s minutes do not indicate whether its members felt there was any opportunity for ballots to be lost or discarded prior to the August 6 meeting. Should any additional information become available, Watershed Voicewill provide follow-up coverage.

Dave Vago is a writer and columnist for Watershed Voice. A Philadelphia native with roots in Three Rivers, Vago is a planning consultant to history and community development organizations and is the former Executive Director of the Three Rivers DDA/Main Street program.