Absentee ballots may delay decisions

Friday, Nov. 3, 2006

Both major parties have promoted the use of absentee ballots as a secure alternative to the state’s electronic voting system after a primary election beset by problems. The public response has shattered old records and increased the likelihood that the outcome of close races will take days to verify.

More than half of the 2,549 absentee ballots doled out in St. Mary’s County had been returned as of Wednesday, said Susan Julian, the election board’s administrative assistant who oversees the absentee ballot program. Longtime elections chief Catherine Countiss can only recall one other time — when a controversial gun law was up for referendum — when there was a similar clamor for absentee ballots.

Although every winner may not be determined on Tuesday night, it’s unlikely that absentees will change the outcome, she said, noting that absentee ballot counts typically mirror the precinct returns.

‘‘The numbers will change for each candidate, but I can’t ever remember a case where it changed the election [winner],” Countiss said.

The absentee votes will not be tabulated until the Thursday after the election. Provisional ballots will be reviewed the following Monday and a final absentee count of military and overseas ballots must be tallied on Nov. 17 before election results are certified.

Democrats and Republicans have both embraced absentee voting since human error and technical flaws tarnished the primary vote. The parties have mailed tens of thousands of letters that included absentee ballot applications, dramatically boosting the total figure.

‘‘If as it holds that 85 percent of the people who requested absentee ballots return them, a significant number of races both locally and statewide will be at least held until after absentee ballots are counted,” said Zach Messitte, a political science professor at St. Mary’s College of Maryland. ‘‘News organizations and the county board of elections will be loathe to declare people the winner until they are mathematically eliminated.”

Statewide, nearly 180,000 absentee ballot requests, thought to be a record-high, had been processed as of Wednesday morning, said Mary Cramer Wagner, who heads the voter registration division at the state elections board. Democrats account for 49 percent of the requests, compared to 41 percent for Republicans, she said. Less than 30 percent were returned as of Wednesday.

Her advice for candidates on election night seems unlikely to be followed by die-hard politicos.

‘‘I told a couple people, ‘Go to bed, don’t wait up, get a good night’s sleep,’” she said.

E-mail Alan Brody at abrody@somdnews.com.