Ohio Undervotes in 2nd Cong Dist??

[harmonyguy]

Many of you know that I'm Canadian, so forgive me if I don't have a complete understanding of today's election. Maybe I missed something or don't understand something.....

I went to the Ohio SoS web site looking for results and got sent to the Hamilton County Web site, which appeared to have crashed.
After a while it came up again, and from my second reading got these results:
http://www.hamilton-co.org/BOE/inputdata/Electionsresults/RealTime/RealTime.pdf

Ballots Cast - Total 119814
Ballots Cast 2nd CongDist 114296
I calculate a difference of 5518

So, do I understand this to suggest that 5518 ballots were cast with no vote recorded for the 2nd CongDist race? Wasn't that considered a top-of-the-ticket race?

Considering that the difference between the candidates was only 3981, shouldn't this be raising some concern somewhere?


HG

[jn2375]

1. should be looked into, keep kicked

[merwin]

2. In most places, that was the ONLY thing on the ticket.

There were a few other items, but those were localized to certain precincts.

[tk2kewl]

5. so ballots were cast for no one and nothing. just blank.

right

[merwin]

13. Apparently so...

[Tigress DEM]

27. Computer crash or malfunction could cause a wipe...

[tk2kewl]

3. kick

:kick:

[GetTheRightVote]

4. kicking it again

:kick:

[wli]

6. where are the FBI? why isn't anyone screaming fraud?

It's *SO* obvious.

[Freddie Stubbs]

35. Paul Hackett has been screaming fraud since the polls closed

Haven't you heard?

[rabid_nerd]

7. NO TIN FOIL HAT LIKELY REQUIRED...

good eye, but it's probably the ballot initiative vote total
Look on the page...

Precinct Count: MT Healthy Cty Tax Levy (5)
Precinct Count: Three Rivers School Tax Levy (18)

Add up votes for candidates + issues and it about matches "ballots cast"...

semantics problem, most likely.

[harmonyguy]

14. Fair enough - I see what you mean....

I guess that especially when a ballot includes multiple races, I expect a ballot to be called a ballot, and a vote to be called a vote. There IS a difference between ballots cast and votes cast.

This is not intended as a snarky remark, (nor is it directed at you) but I've seen a lot of posts about dilligent hard-working election staff trying to to their best, and I have no doubt that many are, BUT it really pisses me off when I see this kind of crap being published. If the election officials that publish this crap can't get the semantics right, then I have to still question how dilligent and hard working they really are.
HG

[claudiajean]

16. They did get the semantics right in this case.

They are reporting 114296 Ballots Cast in the 2nd Congressional District within their county.

They are reporting 119814 Ballots Cast in the entirety of the election jurisidiction, which is the entire County, NOT the 2nd Congressional, which does not cover the whole county.

I'm sorry to disagree with you, J, but their report is perfect as to form, semantics, and vocabulary.

[Land Shark]

21. It is POSSIBLY in good form, if the 2nd covers only part of the county...

[Land Shark]

24. Here's a map of the second congressional district

looks like the second covers a little less than half of Hamilton county.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohio_Second_Congressional_District_Election,_2005>

Look what lostnfound posted as a graph, comparing Hamilton to other counties relative to kerry's performance, at post 13 in this thread:

<http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4247959>

[harmonyguy]

29. Thanks ClaudiaJean

I defer to more knowledgable wisdom. {if there was one, this would be a smiley of me humbly bowing ;-) }

Being a Canuck, I didn't think of the boundary differences.:blush:
HG

[sandnsea]

8. Yes it should

I would imagine people from the campaign will be going over the returns, precinct by precinct. They'll see where those undervotes are at and whether there's any correlation to the school, road and firefighter bonds. Also the kinds of ballots and historic problems. We always have an undervote where I live, even when there's only one thing on the ballot. Some people really do just use the wrong kind of marker, or otherwise screw up.

I would bet plenty of Duers will be taking a close look too.

[bleever]

9. Second nomination. Third?

Thanks, harmonyguy.

[tk2kewl]

10. done

[claudiajean]

11. Rabid_Nerd got it - there are other contests not in the 2nd.

The county has a couple of special purpose districts with contests on the ballot (like school, for example), and they have a small population in those districts with a contest on the ballot that do not overlap the 2nd congressional district.

So the total ballots are the total number of ballots for all jurisdictions, and the 2nd Congressional ballots are those in the 2nd.

No problem with those numbers.

Ballots Cast - Total 119814
Ballots Cast 2nd CongDist 114296

What it means is that 5518 ballots properly did not have the 2nd Congressional District race, as they are not in that district.

[Bill Bored]

18. Sooooooooooooo, how many undervotes for Congress were there then? nt

[claudiajean]

19. None, as of this report.

The total votes cast balances with the total ballots cast.

114,296 votes = 114,296 ballots in the 2nd.

I would expect to see fewer than 5 blank cards per 100,000 in a single issue election (as most voters in the 2nd had), as it is rare that a voter will schlep all the way to the polls when there is only one thing on the ballot simply to vote a blank card.

[Bill Bored]

20. Yes that would be suspicious. Thanks. nt

[Land Shark]

22. Is there a cite for the political map of the county?

[Land Shark]

23. Undervotes = Total Ballots counted - total votes congress

if you have the above figures (including any write in votes and third parties) then you can calculate undervotes

[WCGreen]

12. PRobably absetee votes....

[bleever]

15. Voting for an absent candidate?

[WCGreen]

17. Sometimes they aren't folded in....

But there are times people will vote for say a local levy but will not vote for the congressional race...

It happens...


Not often but it does

[Tigress DEM]

26. But there was a computer crash....

while Schmidt was 800 ahead, I think someone said.


Get this picture of someone accidentally tripping on the power cord... or flipping the switch - accidentally of course.

It IS good enough that Paul got as many votes as he did in this kind of election. It makes a new road map for DEMS, but it's easy to be suspicious even if there isn't any real proof after what Blackwell did in 2004.

[Tigress DEM]

25. kick

[Paradise]

28. kick! n/t

[FogerRox]

30. Is the 2nd CD a Punchcard area?

I was listening to Mike Malloy last nite--

A Caller said that returns stopped coming in for about an hour-- at that point Col. Hackett was down about 800-- then the final returns came in after nothing for an hour-- and "hack" had lost.

I also heard on mikes show and read it in todays NYT that "Hack" did well in rural ares and Schmidt did well in Suburbia---
I thought the conventional wisdom was that "HAck" would do well in Suburban and urban centers-- Dem strongholds.
This seems counter intuitive to me.

[Paradise]

31. perhaps someone in the du ohio forum could answer that question.

it doesn't sound plausible, does it...

[mod mom]

32. My guess is the rural poor are being effected by the war and also

economically. It's the suburban, SUV driving, white flight, suburbanites too busy shopping to notice the war, or be bothered to see how bush's policies are effecting others.

I went to grad school in Cincinnati. Although a beautiful city, it was way too conservative for moi. I grew up in the midwest and I definitely think that most of southern Ohio resembles the south over the mid west. After grad school I moved to Columbus (met mod dad) which although is only ~100 miles, seems like a bastion of liberalism in comparison.

[Fly by night]

33. Yes. Punch-card and optical scan.

[mod mom]

34. District 2 Summary of voting machines by J30:

Executive summary:  Brown County will be using a new precinct-count
> optical-scan system, Clermont County will be using their old central-count
> optical-scan system, and the five other counties voting in tomorrow's OH2
> election will be using their old punch-card systems.
> -----
> 
> Today I spoke with someone at six of the seven county boards of elections for
> Congressional District 2, which has the election tomorrow, with reports as
> follows:
> 
> Adams County (35 precincts) will be using their 2004 machines (punch card).
> They have received new machines, which are expected to be checked out by
> someone from the Secretary of State office this Thursday or Friday, and they
> plan to use the new machines in November.
> 
> Brown County (35 precincts) used punch cards in 2004, but will be using new
> optical scan machines in the Aug 2 special election.  I believe the new system
> is precinct-count optical-scan (PCOS), where voters have one machine available
> in each precinct to allow the voter to check validity of the ballot, which
> should reduce the possibility of overvotes and undervotes (which should be
> highly unlikely in a contest with only two candidates for a single office, but
> who knows what might be possible when write-ins are allowed).
> 
> Clermont County (191 precincts) will use the same setup as in 2004, with
> voters marking optical-scan ballots in each precinct, and all ballots being
> counted at the board offices, using four optical-scan readers.
> 
> Hamilton County (319 precincts in special primary; 1,013 precincts in 2004
> general election) had a voice-mail system with a wait for a live person to
> talk to, so I am assuming that they will still use the punch card system used
> in 2004.
> 
> Pike County (24 precincts) will be using punch cards, as in 2004.  They have
> received new machines which have been checked out, and expect to use them for
> the November election.
> 
> Scioto County (106 precincts) will be using punch cards, as in 2004.  They
> have decided to use optical scan in future elections, and that might be
> possible by November.
> 
> Warren County (79 precincts in special primary; 157 precincts in 2004 general
> election) will be using punch cards, as in 2004.  Person I talked to offered
> to let me talk to the director about future machine use, but I declined.
> 
> --