Manual check of ballots shows Craven vote count OK

The 20,249 primary votes cast by Craven County voters and tallied by machines on Tuesday stood up to scrutiny Thursday.

"The numbers we matched hand-to-eye are matching the machine numbers," said Tonya Pitts, Craven County elections director.

The sample ballot count is required by the North Carolina State Board of Elections, which picks the precincts and races to be recounted. A five-vote margin of error is permissible except in tight races.

"Our report to the state will say all numbers for precincts sampled are within the allowable range and in most cases there are no discrepancies," Pitts said. She said any race in which candidates differ by 10 or fewer votes would automatically be recounted.

Four teams of three election workers re-counted ballots marked in Rhems, Grantham 2B, and Ernul precincts. Each group had representation from both the Democratic and Republican parties and was supervised by a county elections board member.

The process required each entry on each ballot - without a name attached - to be read allowed and counted by the election teams of Bonnie Love, Fay Willingham and Martha Aligood; Sonja Provenchal, John Grady and Barbara Smith; Phil Bennett, Ingrid Stanley and Sybilene Bixler; and Tom Hardin, Evelyn Hatley and Lois Damico.

The recount went from 9 until 10:25 a.m.

"We are double checking," said Ray Woods, elections board secretary. "I think it is interesting that we have some ballots with no votes."

Elections Board Chairman Esther Hardin said: "I think the election has gone well. At the next board meeting we will have some issues to discuss but overall I think it went very smoothly."

A few complaints were lodged by voters, including from the Rhems precinct where voters were being asked for identification before they could vote.

"An error was made by a chief judge," said Bill Miner, elections board member. "It was stopped. No voter was turned away for any reason."

Pitts said, "We have about 200 poll workers and a number of them are new." She said some more intensive poll worker training is needed before the next election, whether it is a primary runoff for commissioner of labor or the November general election.