Mat-Su Borough will hand count ballots from now on

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A resolution to hand count ballots in Mat-Su Borough elections passed the Assembly on Tuesday night. The hand count will be centralized at the Mat-Su Borough building, rather than done at the precincts. Machines will still be used to count ballots, but hand counting will be done as well.

Thirty-seven people testified in favor of removing the election machines and doing only a hand count. One testifier represented 7 others, and one represented three others, for a total of 45 in favor of removing the machines, and four testifying against removing them.

At a meeting in August, when the issue was first brought up, about 65-70 people attended and 30 testified that they don’t trust the vote tabulating machines.

Assemblyman Ron Bernier said that he will introduce an ordinance to remove the voting machines. That ordinance will be introduced Oct. 4, and the public hearing is scheduled for Oct. 16.

29 COMMENTS

  1. Let’s see if the political affiliation of those elected shifts suddenly.
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    Advice to both sides of the political aisle. Get involved in the counting. It does not matter whether the machines were altering the vote count or not if only one side of the political aisle is doing all the counting.

  2. And will the results still be trusted? What happens when there is an inevitable discrepancy? Way to roll things back to the mid-twentieth century.

    • Valid point.
      However, the ability of people counting votes to alter the outcome is several orders of magnitude more difficult that doing so with a machine.
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      I would rather trust to the frailties of human counting, than to a machine that is, supposedly, not connected to a network. Well, except when it is. Or how about when they upgraded the software, or something, in the middle of a ballot count. Or, when the software glitches. Or when the person with the administrative password wipes the machine.
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      Yeah. Give me a few mistakes with the hand count. Any day of the week.

      • You do realize that just about everything we buy is manufactured, sorted, counted, and/or packaged by machines, right? Should vitamins be hand counted? What about cash deposits at banks–do you trust the teller or the bill counter? What about your email inbox–do you believe it when it says you have a dozen unread messages, or do you individually count them? To think that machines are incapable or can be somehow manipulated to change a vote tally indicates too much time on social media and “alternative news”. None of the Republican led hand recounts across the country identified any nefarious activity and any changes in results were beyond nominal. This paranoia over machine vote counts is going to backfire.

        • Tell me.
          What benefit is derived from altering the count of machines that count pills? How much incentive is there to hack into it, and change numbers around?
          Same for the rest of your examples. The juice is generally not worth the squeeze.
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          On the other hand, a small, almost undetectable change to a vote count has MASSIVE impact. if I rig a vote counting machine to randomly change between one and three votes per every hundred counted, it would result in a swing of 4% or so. That is an election right there, and without a forensic audit of the votes, odds are no one would see it. Or I could just do one per hundred, and have the machine add a vote for my preferred candidate every 150 ballots counted or so.
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          The issue here is not can machines be trusted to do their job. They can. What the issue here is can the humans programming and controlling the machines alter the outcome in an undetectable manner. And, when it comes to secret/anonymous ballots, I trust no single individual.

  3. Good. Get rid of the cheating machines and get back to human counting. May not be perfect, but it has been what has been used in the past for many many years. This is the exact reason I refuse to vote anymore.
    The machines are skewed and manipulated. Take em down. The entire state needs to get back to human counting, not just Mat-Su Valley!

    • We should do the same for banking and accounting, who can trust that your paychecks and taxes are being calculated properly by those skewed and manipulated machines.

      • Frank – banks would soon be out of business were they to start cheating customers electronically. It would be a “one and done” and folks just wouldn’t go back. Voting, however, is another story. The sad truth is that a lot of folks, maybe even the majority, think more about their finances than they do about protecting their voting liberties even though the two are inextricably linked. The Bidinflation we are currently enduring is a perfect example. 84 million votes my ass!

      • I can also do a forensic audit on all the numbers, and chase down the error.
        Can I do that with the vote counting machines?

  4. This will last one election cycle until after voters realize they must wait 2 weeks for local election results after the State and National results which are machine counted. Palmer will be randomly selecting precincts for hand count audits. Much smarter and less costly.

  5. Machines don’t care. Run the same set of ballots thru them a dozen times. They just tally up the counts. It makes things so difficult when you add humans to the mix, they notice things. Small beginnings is what this is.

      • WGB – just heard today that Georgia Dems are requesting that Dominion Voting machines in one county be declared “compromised” due to possible data manipulation.

    • One option Dominion has is weighed voting.
      That means your vote may be valued at more or less than one vote.
      Some places in the world allow that.
      Those things are not counting machines. They are computers.
      And the only thing they cannot do is make coffee.

  6. Please please have surveillance and proof that makes this election irreputable! Then the election shift will not be blamed on partisans

  7. Time to make ballots on stone tablets for Neanderthals in the valley.
    1 represents 7 others and 1 represents 3 others….wtf…what happened to 1 man/woman = 1 vote.

    Wait it’s the valley, they’re understandless…

  8. WOW ! I’m getting a little faith that at least some Alaskans are paying attention. Our Elections have been turned into Selections and we seem to be asleep or too afraid to speak up. Wake up Alaska and America. This is likely your last chance to reclaim your vote ! Beigich is a fake and Murkowski is a traitor,
    P.S. I’m moving to Mat-Su!

  9. Finally a strong three sided structure for accuracy (minimum structure). First: registration count taken when voter signs registration book. Second: machine count. Third: hand count.

  10. Gerry Mandering – WTF does “understandless” mean? People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones! LMFAO!

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