ALAMOSA — Unofficial results in the Alamosa School District’s (ASD) Board of Education (BOE) District 1 race currently show Andria Gay, the incumbent appointed to the position after the resignation of Justin Rilling, with just a four-vote lead of 1,508 (50.07%) over challenger Kaylee Romero Gomez at 1,504 (49.93%). But that outcome may be impacted by votes from a variety of sources that have not yet been counted.
Those tallies include voters in Alamosa County and a small segment of voters in northern Conejos County whose addresses fall within ASD boundaries.
According to the clerk’s office, as of Wednesday morning, 109 ballots — comprised of military and overseas voters — have yet to be counted. The deadline for those ballots to be received at the clerk’s office is, by law, Nov. 15, eight days after the day the election was held.
There are also an undisclosed number of ballots not yet counted due to issues such as no signature on the envelope that contained the ballot or a signature that does not exactly match the signature on file.
Letters to voters who have issues with their ballots were sent out Wednesday, Nov. 8, informing them they also have until Nov. 15 to come to the clerk’s office to “cure” the problem. Once “cured,” the ballots are cleared to be counted.
But there are also other ballots that have not been added into the total. As part of a regular practice each election, the clerk’s office has held back a batch of 25 eligible ballots in order to protect anyone from knowing how a voter with a cured ballot voted.
This safeguard is in support of Article VII, Section 8 of the Colorado Constitution which states, "All elections shall be by ballot, and in case paper ballots are required to be used, no ballots shall be marked in any way whereby the ballot can be identified as the ballot of the person casting it."
Terri Carver, an outside election supervisor with a history of working with the clerk’s office during elections, explained it further.
“If all the ballots were counted and, for example, two cured ballots were added to the total, the difference in the totals would make it easy to tell how those two people voted,” Carver said.
Mixing the cured ballots in with the batch of 25 prevents anyone from knowing who cast which vote, she says.
In yet one more unknown, Carver also confirmed that some of those 25 ballots not yet counted included ballots where people voted in ASD’s Board of Education District 1. With only four votes separating the two candidates, those votes could also impact the race's outcome.
Variables in the situation were confirmed in comments made to the Alamosa County Commissioners Wednesday morning when, according to John Waters with the Valley Courier, “election officials spoke with the Alamosa County Commissioners…and reported that ‘for a variety of reasons, there are numerous ballots that need examination, etc. and they stressed the numbers are unofficial.’”
When asked if there would be a recount if the certified votes continue to fall within such a narrow margin, Carver stated that would only happen if one or both candidates requested it be conducted. That request cannot be made until after the election is certified, which will not be before the end of day Nov. 15.
