Recount process begins for supervisor race, Arnold votes against election results 

As San Luis Obispo County elections officials started work on a resident's request for a hand recount of the 4th District supervisor race on July 19, a sitting county supervisor voted the same day to "protest" the June 7 election results.

click to enlarge

• File Photo By Peter Johnson
• BALLOT (RE)COUNTING The SLO County Clerk-Recorder's Office is in the process of isolating June 7 ballots that were cast by voters in the 4th supervisorial district, as part of the hand recount requested by a Paso Robles resident.

"I just want to say that I still have some unresolved concerns about the accuracy of the ballot counting," 5th District Supervisor Debbie Arnold said, without citing evidence, during a meeting where the Board of Supervisors formally declared the results. "Some of my concerns stem from the recent changes to the election processes. All-mail, drop boxes, the use of tabulation ... I believe they make our elections less secure."

Earlier that morning, across the hall from the board chambers, Paso Robles resident Darcia Stebbens dropped off a $12,282 cashier's check to the county clerk-recorder to kick off the hand recount she requested of the race between incumbent Supervisor Lynn Compton and Supervisor-elect Jimmy Paulding.

The recount, which Stebbens asked for on July 12 and must pay for, is estimated to take up to seven weeks and cost upward of $100,000, according to Clerk-Recorder Elaina Cano. Paulding won the election by 639 votes, per the certified results. Compton is not a participating party in the recount, she told New Times.

On July 15, Stebbens, Richard Patten—author of SLO County's redistricting map—and Laura Mordaunt filed paperwork to start a political fundraising committee named the SLO County Citizens Action Team. On July 19, the Republican Party of SLO County shared a Citizens Action Team flyer to its Facebook page calling for donations to help fund the recount.

"Believe in accurate and honest elections? How many ballots did you receive? Where are all the unused ballots? ... Help us shine the light on how these votes got counted," the flyer read. "A small but mighty group of citizens are standing up for Truth and Transparency, will you stand with them [?]"

The flyer lists the group's goals as: "to purge the voter rolls"; "require photo voter ID"; "election day only voting"; "smaller consolidation of precincts"; "election day becomes a holiday or half day for voting"; "counting precinct voted ballots election night"; and "follow up with machine counting."

No finance records for the committee were available by press time. An email to the committee went unreturned. The phone number listed matched that of the Republican Party of SLO County headquarters in Atascadero.

In order for the recount to continue moving forward, Stebbens must pay a daily deposit of $2,930 to the county clerk's office. As of July 20, Cano said her office was working to isolate all of the ballots from the 4th District—a process that is likely to take several days in and of itself.

"There's a lot of preparation that has to go into it," Cano told New Times. "We have to now open up every one of our ballot boxes that has a ballot that contains the 4th District. I want to say it's almost all of them."

Cano said that Stebbens listed five specific precincts she wanted the county to prioritize, which her staff is focusing on first.

The request for a recount is the first that Cano's seen in her clerking career from a non-candidate in a race. While she said she's sympathetic to residents' concerns and confusion about changes to elections, she is "100 percent confident in the process and security of the election" and believes the recount will demonstrate that.

"This is what I'd urge people who are still on the fence about this: Be sure to be getting your information from the proper resource," Cano said. "Elections are complex. It's not easy. But it's when other people try to provide their own opinions about how things are conducted, I think that's where the confusion and mistrust [comes from] about really a process that is very, very, very secure."

Cano's assurances did not sway Arnold, who cast the lone dissent vote on the Board of Supervisors to declare the June 7 results—a typically routine action following elections.

"They've created so many vulnerabilities," Arnold claimed, "that the public is losing confidence in the election process." Δ