From my mailbox, apparently the Pennington County commission is telling the Pennington County GOP they can hand count if they want. But they have to meet a few conditions first:
Someone explain to me how bringing in an additional 230 people (46 precincts times 5 people) versus one centrally located machine is a “great savings for the county?”
I’m sure this will go well.
Math wasn’t my strong suit either. Painful sometimes.
The election is 2 weeks away Pennington county has already spent the money on programming. This is going to just be more expense for a county who’s commission loves talking about being efficient and saving money
Hand counting is not saving money at this point. You are right programming and everything is already paid for. Even the largest county is tabulating the runoff. Pennington please don’t try to fix what is not broken.
Actually more than 230. 5 per precinct, PLUS alternates.
Don’t forget the boards aren’t all republicans)or shouldn’t be) are the republicans finding the appropriate number of non republicans to serve also.
Let’s do some math if 5 per board plus an extra and they have 46 precincts that’s 276 people. So if they get paid $25 an hour and it take one hr that’s $6,900 but could take two hours so now at $13,800. Let’s add in school and school for a poll worker is $45 that’s an additional $12,420. Now we are at $26,220. I called the County today and asked what they spent for this years annual maintenance contract and it was just over $30,000. So here we are we’re almost going to be spending that if the commission says we’re hand counting. And to make more sense of this 30,000 was one time fee for this year in the county Auditors Office will have a total of four elections by end of year. And when the County has a shared election they bill for a portion of that maintenance agreement to the entities, not only as a portion of the maintenance agreement but so is a portion of everything else from the cost of ballots the cost of the poll workers and many other things for the election. But has anyone ever asked questions nope.
This has got to be the biggest joke I have ever seen! Where are all the smart Republicans that know this does not pass the common sense test? Please show up at the July 21. Meeting to speak. Let’s not just give the squeaky voice the Microphone. If they need 230 people at $25 hour that’s $5,750. It takes less people to tabulate at the central location.
Wait until Mulally gets in that auditors office. Everyone’s gonna be fighting over the tinfoil hats. It’s gonna be such a mess the next 4 years. I hope Sabrina Green runs again in 4 years. The county is gonna be screaming for her to come back.
When mulally gets a taste of the workload I bet
She’s out before her term is up. I hope the county keeps Sabrina around so she’s easy to appoint when $h!t hits the fan and they need someone good!
Leah and Tina is a story no one is talking about. The two biggest counties.
This is going to be a massive cluster !*%#. Imagine if you will, the grandma’s at the polling places hand counting each ballot. Now granted, its just one item to count, but there is no way this makes getting results faster. I wish the “election integrity” doorknobs would just put the crack pipe down for one election cycle and see that South Dakota’s system works pretty darn well. I guess one can dream.
It’s a fool’s errand. The county commission is making a point.
Once each precinct is hand counted, they can run the ballots through the machine in less time than it will take to add the 46 subtotals together, and I’d love to see the discrepancy between those two numbers much less a cost comparison of the two methods. Maybe this is a good “give ’em what they want” test.
Wait until Mulally takes over. This office is going to turn into a real clown show. Get these wingnuts out of office next election. We need people who actually have common sense instead of a bunch of conspiracy nut cases.
Clowns and insanerism aside, you must admit that Ms. Mulally will bring a certain high-fashion avant-garde to the office. Her blouses can be maximalistic and flamboyant, and you will learn to hope she is wearing undergarments.
She has no fashion.
You folks realize this is just the start, right? Unless Davis can beat Baxter, we’ve got 4 years of “integrity” insanity ahead of us coming directly from the state capitol.
The majority of the commission may vote to hand count, but if that is the case I will not be voting with the majority. Business, including financial institutions, long ago chose to accept technology for accuracy and efficiency. There is nothing factual to show the election tabulators are not accurate. Election tabulators are not connected to the internet!
Appreciate your hard work, Gary!
This is a very valid point. Take a stack of various currencies to a bank. They put it into a machine to count it. That machine is not hooked up to the Internet. And it is extremely accurate.
Sound similar? I wonder if these people would trust that? Probably not. They probably use coffee cans buried in their back yard.
You’re gonna have your hands full when Mulally gets in the auditors office. I can’t wait to see this circus show and how much the people who voted for her are gonna regret this.
Why are only ONE political party being invited to count votes? I get it, its a GOP primary but still, poll workers and election day workers and counters are just one party. Seriously, can someone explain this to me?
EDIT: Poll workers and election day workers and counters aren’t just from one party****
Hold on here…
If the Pennington County GOP brings in an additional 230 “helpers” AND they wear their
Flip Flops, that’s and additional 2300 toes that they didn’t previously have at their disposal.
That’s sure to speed things up!
P. S. Noseplugs optional because of the smell.
100% idiots. they think they will be faster and more accurate than the tabulator? hahahha.
It’s a low IQ group showing up to GOP events now days.
These people are vastly underemployed, with wayyyy too much free time that none of the rest of us have.
So, if they can’t find the required 250 people to do this – then they will use the auto tabulators. I think the Commission and Auditor’s office needs to “hand-count” the number of people who apply to do this. I thought this nonsense was cleared up in 2022 with Tripp county that did the hand-count and it was not as accurate. I might vote for a Democrat for the first time ever – just to protect our voting. No independents running for SOS??
Actually there is an independent running. Tamara Lesnar is the Libertarian candidate for SOS.
What’s her opinion on hand-counting ballots?
Nevermind …just looked her up. YIKES! her experience is that of a zoologist and an empath. so very helpful for a secretary of state. She also thought she could run for US Senate and then US House, when those failed, then she goes for SOS. Is the ballot finalized? can we find anyone else? And the out of state people that think SD needs fixing and they KNOW how to do it. yeah… modern day carpet baggers. smh
Wait till Mulally is in that office. We haven’t even seen the worst of it yet. She lied to get into that office and the county is gonna pay the price. She turned an actual job into a political propaganda. Mulally is a crazy nut case who’s addicted to gambling and has a horrible past. I can’t believe this county actually voted her in. To many nut cases moving into this county.
I was at my auditors office doing this and that yesterday, and I overheard someone who updated their registration and early-voted mention that someone contacted them about being a poll worker. They asked if there were a variety of shifts, and was told workers had to be on site in the room for the whole 12 hour stretch, by statute. “Well someone should change the law” they said as they took their ballot to the cubicle. I whispered to my wife, hey I LIKE that law, it’s a good law, don’t always be changing laws on momentary whims.
Imagine driving to another county commission meeting, outside of your own county, to argue for hand counts because Trump was at Mount Rushmore. This is exactly what California Carley did at the latest Pennington County Commission meeting. I wonder if he has presented this in his home county, Meade county, or any other counties? Nothing says “local control” and “state’s rights” like swerving into another county and pushing for something because President Trump mentioned it…….i am glad this transplant was voted out but fear he will hold a cabinet position if Doeden is elected.
You’re assuming he could be in the cabinet. The Lt. pick hasn’t been announced yet…
Meade County voted Carley out of office so he”s mad at us, which is good.
BTW, in the City of Sioux Falls recount, the machine tabulated votes only revealed 2 vote errors. Yes, that’s 2 out of over 35,000 votes cast. That represents a 99.994% accuracy rate. I don’t believe hand counting will be as accurate and certainly not as fast. But, knock yourself out.
And these ‘errors’ were probably due to the voter not following the instructions completely. A check or an x but they didn’t fill in the oval. Leah herself even said the recount proves that there is very little error in the process. She had to mean tabulation too.
Good grief! It’s a bluff, the Commission is calling the GOP’s bluff…they are literally calling out Pollema and Weibel’s bluff. Wanna hand count? Fine, but you better bring a whole bunch of like-minded idiots with you to Rapid City.
There is heavy recruiting even as we speak.
This is the results of the right-wingers, they voted Mona in as SoS at last convention as she was all for hand counting but then she didn’t make them happy so at this convention they voted her out and voted in the new SoS as she is all for hand counting. This after she didn’t get voted into the legislature in her own district. If your own district doesn’t want you representing them why would the rest of the state want her to be SoS?