The Putnam County Election Commission set 11 p.m. as the cutoff time for counting votes for August’s election.
Election Commission Administrator Michele Honeycutt said elections officials across the state have expressed concerns over how long it will take to count absentee ballots on election night August 6. She told the commission at Wednesday’s meeting they are concerned about worker fatigue.
“I know some of the counties have said on a conference call that they are not keeping their workers all night long,” Honeycutt said. “That will cause errors, and they don’t want that, so they are sending them home to sleep and then coming back.”
Honeycutt said the election office has sent out between 700 and 800 absentee ballots thus far. She said the normal amount for an election like August’s is around 200. The largest number of received absentee ballots Honeycutt said she remembers was 800 for a presidential election. She said they were able to count all those ballots the same night.
Commission Chairman Phil Adams said state law allows for the Commission to finish counting votes the following day. Commissioner Linda Daniel made a successful motion to allow the Counting Board to use its own discretion on stopping at 11 p.m. and resuming on the Morning of August 7.
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