Pinal County has a plan for how to address a massive ballot problem which led to about 63,000 voters in seven municipalities receiving an incorrect early ballot in the mail last week.
The board of supervisors approved the plan at a special session Tuesday, but not before an extraordinary display of professional accountability was exhibited by Pinal County’s election director as he explained how so many voters on the Active Early Voting List (AEVL) received bad ballots for the current Aug. 2 primary election.
“Due to human errors made by myself and staff under my direct supervision, ballots were produced and mailed to voters within seven municipalities without the appropriate local races and measures,” David Frisk told the supervisors and several municipal representatives in attendance.
The error also resulted in some voters in unincorporated areas of Pinal County received ballots for local races but should not have.
Frisk further refused to make excuses for the error, going so far as to brush aside an apparent attempt by one of the supervisors to blame low staffing issues for the error with dozens of the 938 ballot styles Frisk’s staff was responsible for proofing.
“I missed the crucial step of ensuring that each ballot style produced had appropriate races on it,” Frisk said. “It was my mistake.”
Such transparency was also exhibited by Chairman Jeffrey McClure, Vice Chairman Jeff Serdy, and Supervisors Mike Goodman, Kevin Cavanaugh, and Stephen Miller who voted at one point to go into an executive session to receive confidential legal advice from Pinal County Attorney Kent Volkmer.
When the supervisors reconvened the public special session, they opted to allow Volkmer to discuss some of the legal issues. The county attorney was also the one who outlined the plan he recommended be approved as soon as possible.
The plan calls for all voters in each of the seven affected municipalities to cast their local race votes on a supplemental ballot, even if they were in a precinct that did not have a problem. Those supplemental ballots will then be tabulated by a machine used only for that purpose.
Volkmer acknowledged the plan is not a perfect nor an easy solution. It is, he said, “the best way we can do it” given all myriad issues at play. He also assured the supervisors that the chances are “very high” the county will be named in at least one lawsuit over the ballot snafu.
While the county will mail a supplemental municipal ballot to each voter on the AEVL who lives in one of the impacted cities or towns, voters in those municipalities who intend to cast their ballot in person will be given both ballots. .
Complicating matters, Volkmer conceded, is the fact some Pinal County voters in the affected municipalities have already voted in person with a ballot missing the municipal races. Those voters will need to contact the Pinal County Recorder’s Office to request the supplemental municipal ballot.
By Tuesday night, county staff already had a Q&A website established to begin explaining the problem and corrective plan. There is also a need to publicize the fact that the problem does not impact the federal, state, and county contests on the ballots.
An option proposed by one of the supervisors was to generate a “robo-call” to those voters for whom the county has a phone number on file.
Serdy allowed a Call to the Public before the supervisors went into executive session. This gave representatives from several of the municipalities an opportunity to express their concerns, including Mayor Micah Powell of Eloy.
A few voters also voiced opinions, with many expressing concern with ensuring voters receive consistent and concise communication from election officials. This would include guidance to voters to use the initial ballots already received so their votes in the federal, state, and county races can be tabulated.
There were also calls for county officials to assure voters that votes will not be counted for any municipal races errantly printed on ballots for voters who do not live in a municipality.
And the supervisors acknowledged there are questions about what the corrective action is going to cost the county, which is contracted by the municipalities to conduct their elections.
“That will be another meeting, later on, after we get through this election,” Serdy noted.
The supplemental ballots might be mailed out as soon as the end of next week although county officials noted the timeline could change.
Pinal County has set up a website for voters to check whether their ballot is affected HERE.