The opposition to the Northern Indiana Regional Transportation District gained a sizable chunk in the official results of the Nov. 3 referendum. The number of votes against the creation of the RTD increased by 313 while those in favor sank by 275 votes since the unofficial count was posted on Nov. 3.

The Porter County Election Board consisting of J.J Stankiewicz, Patrick Lyp and County Clerk Pam Fish gathered at the Voters Registration Office on Friday to approve the official results of this year’s referendum. After a few modifications during the 10-day period, including flipped results from three precincts, the official results showed a refined count of 2,847 voters who said yes to the RTD while 12,568 said no.

Voters Registration Democrat Director Kathy Kozuszek said the Voters Registration office issued 10 provisional ballots, but only seven were officially counted in the total vote. She said one of the three ballots not counted was due to one voter declining to provide proper photo identification. Kozuszek also said five military and overseas ballots had also been received and counted towards the official count after the election was held.

Two precincts, Center 22 and Morgan 1, failed to initially include absentee ballots delivered to them by the Porter County Sherriff’s Office the day of the election. The ballots were later discovered by the poll workers and since have been tallied into the official count. Approximately 1,300 absentee ballots were counted in total.

Pine 2, Westchester 15 and Porter 6 were the three precincts that reported flipped results. Kozuszek said she doesn’t know the exact reason the poll workers at those precincts reported incorrect results initially but that she believes the error was accidental. She also said she suspects worker fatigue as a factor for the confusion.

Fourteen of the 126 voting precincts in Porter County experienced modifications since the initial results 10 days earlier. Despite a few of these minor calculation problems, the Election Board praised Kozuszek, Republican Director Sundae Kubacki and all the poll workers for their hard work in this year’s election.

“We met our goals of being credible, accurate and quick,” Stankiewicz said.

Stankiewicz also complemented Kozuszek and Kubacki in their creative thinking to lower the cost of the off-year election. The two directors chose to use paper ballots for the votes instead of the computer ballots generally used in counting votes. The cost of the election turned out to be less than expected with a final figure of $91,934, nearly $30,000 less than what Kozuszek and Kubacki originally estimated with the paper ballots. The original cost using the computer ballots would have been near $300,000, Stankiewicz said.

Stankiewicz concluded by saying he was proud of the team effort involved in being as accurate as possible in this off-year election. No official complaints were issued by registered voters during the election. The board voted unanimously to approve the official results, which will be sent to the state election division.

The board will meet next on Friday, Dec. 11, to discuss the option of renewing the current ballot vendor, ESNS Electronic Voting System and Software. Fish said the board will try to have the decision in place by January so the Voters Registration Office can begin making arrangements for the 2010 general election.

Posted 11/16/2009