The Sedgwick County board of canvassers met Thursday in downtown Wichita to approve the process of counting provisional ballots from the November 4th mid-term election. KMUW’s Carla Eckels reports…
A provisional ballot is cast when voters’ eligibility is questioned. Four thousand of those were presented Thursday morning to the canvass board.
About 140 provisional ballots were cast due to errors made by poll workers. Sedgwick County Election Commissioner Tabitha Lehman says other voters lacked needed documents.
"We did have 97 people who cast a provisional ballot because they had not provide proof of citizenship and so those 97 were not counted," Lehman said, "and then we had I believe it was about 33 that were not counted because they did not provide ID."
Four people who used the federal form to register to vote had not provided citizenship documents. Their votes will count for the federal offices only.
In the Sedgwick County Commission Race District 4, Democrat Melody McCray-Miller lost to incumbent Republican Richard Ranzau by 544 votes. She stood with other Wichitans who wanted to observe the outcome of the provisional vote count.
"The reason why I’m here is because I simply believe in this democratic democracy that we live in," said McCray-Miller, "and so when people cast a vote, that vote should be counted and that’s what we’re watching for today."
The 4th district race was narrowed to 450 votes with Ranzau remaining the winner. There was also a 28 vote difference in the Kansas House 88th district. Lehman says candidates may very well ask for a recount. Of the 4000 provisional ballots about 500 were tossed out.
This story originally published on Friday, November 14, 2014 at 5:00 a.m.
