The November 2019 Guilford County election is in the bag and Charlie Collicutt, the Board of Elections director for the county, said this was a particularly smooth one.
Collicutt said on Wednesday, Nov. 6, the day after the votes were cast, that there were no major hiccups during the election that determined many city council and town council seats – and an election that served as a test for one new voting machine.
According to Collicutt, the only problem came at a precinct in High Point where police had to be called after one man, who was being chased by another man, ran into the polling place and there was some sort of altercation.
Ironically, that incident occurred at the Redeeming Love Worship Center.
Meanwhile, at another polling place, the county’s Board of Elections was testing a new type of voting machine that will, upon final approval, be used in the 2020 elections. To make sure that machine performed correctly, elections staff is comparing the handwritten ballots at that precinct with the machine’s results to make sure the two match. Collicutt said that, at this point in the process, there’s no indication of any issues with the machine that was being put to the test.
Since there was no election in Greensboro, this was a light election with only about 50 precincts in action which is one reason everything went smoothly – it is the calm before the no-doubt eventful election that will be held a year from now.
Collicutt said that, on Wednesday, he and his staff were making sure that all results from all machines had been reported accurately – for instance, he said, one check is to see that the number of voters at each precinct matches the number of ballots cast.
He said the elections office is also taking the steps necessary to process “provisional votes.” Those are votes cast where there’s some question whether the voter is legally able to vote. That voters’ ballot is collected and later the Guilford County Board of Elections looks at the facts and determines whether the vote should be counted or not.
On Thursday, Nov. 14 the Guilford County Board of Elections will meet to make the results of the 2019 election official.
