May 14, 2024 By Mike Jones 3 min read

Washington County’s elections board certified last month’s primary, paving the way for the results to be sent to the state before Monday’s deadline.

Elections Director Melanie Ostrander told the board during their Monday meeting that the April 23 primary went smoothly, and her staff and volunteers have been spending the past few weeks tabulating write-in votes, reviewing provisional ballots and hand-counted 10 precincts at random.

As part of that, they conducted a “risk limiting audit” on the Democratic treasurer’s race, which the state Department of State selected at random and required all counties to perform.

“Everything was in line,” Ostrander said.

Commissioners Nick Sherman, Electra Janis and Larry Maggi, who sit on the elections board, unanimously certified the results so they can be sent by the state.

Following the vote, Maggi asked about the 286 mail-in and absentee ballots that weren’t counted due to fatal flaws, such as missing signatures or problems with dates.

“Did anyone call (the elections office) and ask about their mail-ins?” Maggi asked about whether any voters raised concerns about problems with their ballots.

“Before (the primary) we had some people inquire,” Ostrander said. “We told them their ballot was received. That’s all the information we could give them.”

The elections board voted 2-1 during its April 11 meeting to not permit voters who made mistakes on their envelope to “cure” their ballots. Sherman and Janis voted to not allow ballot curing while Maggi voted in favor of permitting people to fix mistakes. In total, there were 251 ballots out of the 286 that weren’t counted that could have been cured if voters were given the opportunity.

Maggi, who is a Democrat, asked his Republican colleagues in Sherman and Janis to reconsider, but they declined to second his motion.

“I would ask to reconsider curing the ballots for the general election,” Maggi said.

“I appreciate you asking,” Sherman responded, but declined to move the request forward.

The elections board is slated to meet again sometime in September ahead of the Nov. 5 general election.

Meanwhile, Greene County’s elections board voted Thursday to certify its results. With both Washington and Greene counties approving the results, that allows state election officials to contact Stephanie Waggett to see if she wants to accept the Democratic nomination for the 50th state House District race after receiving the most write-in votes during the primary.

Waggett, who lost to state Rep. Bud Cook in the Republican primary, did not respond to a phone message Monday to see if she plans to accept the nomination to run again in the general election.