Luzerne County mail ballot tallying to continue today

Due to a staffing shortage, Luzerne County did not complete tallying of most mail ballots on Election Day Tuesday, leaving the lion’s share — 11,000 — to address today, officials said.

As of 6 p.m., workers had unsealed, processed and scanned approximately 7,000 of the more than 17,900 mail ballots returned by voters, said County Acting Manager Romilda Crocamo.

Crocamo said the shortage stems largely from a funding change. Since mail ballot voting took effect in 2020, the county was able to use federal coronavirus assistance funding to pay workers overtime to stay through the evening processing the ballots. Without that funding in this election, overtime was not offered because it would have to be covered by the election bureau’s budget, she said.

Only 10 to 15 workers assisted with the mail ballot processing, compared to approximately 35 in last November’s general election, Crocamo said.

The workers were sworn in Tuesday morning to start unsealing mail envelopes and scanning the ballots, known as pre-canvassing, inside a third-floor courtroom at the county-owned Penn Place Building.

The administration expects 13 county workers will return to Penn Place Wednesday morning to continue processing the mail ballots, Crocamo said.

In total, the county issued 22,933 mail ballots to voters who submitted applications requesting them, the administration said.

Mail ballots had to be physically in the election bureau by 8 p.m. Tuesday to be counted.

A party breakdown of the mail ballots was not immediately available, although the option has been more popular with Democrats than Republicans in recent elections.

County Controller Walter Griffith said the administration should have alerted council if funding was an issue, saying money could have been transferred from the budget reserve to cover overtime.

“The administration knew the amount of mail ballots days ago and made no provisions to address staffing concerns. This is unacceptable,” Griffith said.

Crocamo said the main priority is processing the ballots accurately — not speed. She also said she was not involved in the election board’s unilateral decision to stop the mail ballot processing around 6 p.m. While it is unlikely all 11,000 remaining ballots would have been counted that evening, continued processing would have reduced the number of ballots outstanding, she said. Crocamo also added that the board was aware of the number of workers assigned and did not raise any concerns to her.

Election Board Chairwoman Denise Williams said she was not aware of the number of workers that would be assigned and said all board members ended up stepping in to help process the ballots because workers started leaving as their shifts ended.

Williams said she will make sure staffing is addressed ahead of time in future elections so the public is aware of how long the mail ballot processing will take. In the last two elections she has served on the board, the administration assigned sufficient staff to complete the mail ballot processing by 8 p.m. on election night, she said.

“It would have been good to make the election board aware of that in advance. Maybe it could have been addressed,” Williams said.

Overall assessment

The election bureau said there were no “global or widespread problems” with polling places or equipment on Election day.

”The overwhelming majority of issues encountered were the result of user error, and were quickly resolved by the active support staff,” said a release from Crocamo.

Election Director Michael Susek credited poll workers for “doing a fantastic job” and said the bureau addressed a “steady stream of minor, routine issues” starting at 5:45 a.m., including workers failing to turn on battery units or enter pass codes into the correct field.

An Election Day support team responded to inquiries, he said. This team included full-time bureau staff, equipment vendors and rovers.

The county tested and programmed more than 1,000 electronic poll books, tabulators, ballot marking devices and other voting equipment, Susek said. One tabulator and four poll books were replaced due to power issues, he said.

Several polling places required last-minute staffing changes, and at least one site opened late due because the building was locked, he said. Most polling places were fully staffed.

The administration described all issues as routine and said it will be working with vendors to ensure power issues are addressed before the November general election.

Williams said there were no “global or programming issues.”

Election Board member Alyssa Fusaro agreed there were no major issues and said the county had rovers and other plans in place to “handle them quickly.”