UPDATE: Audit of Election Results Friday

On Election Day, 649 residents voted for First Selectman David Campbell at Town Hall, and 709 residents at Hindley School voted the same way. Or did they? The two Darien voting districts have been randomly selected for a State audit of the Nov. 3 election results; the manual tabulation will take place this Friday.

Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz announced news of the audit last week.

“We had a very smooth Municipal Election Day last Tuesday, but … we in Connecticut don’t just take the machines’ word for it,” said Bysiewicz in her Nov. 10 news release.

State law requires an audit of ten percent of polling places in all elections and primaries; that means that of the 597 polling precincts used on Nov. 3, 60 will have their election results hand counted—ballot for ballot—and matched against machine totals. In Darien, District 2/Town Hall and District 4/Hindley School were among those precincts randomly selected.

Neighboring municipalities Westport and Wilton are also subject to the audit; New Canaan is among the eight selected alternate municipalities.

A drawing will be held at 11 a.m. on Thursday, Nov. 19 at the Darien Town Hall to determine which three offices will be audited. The counting of ballots will take place at 8:30 a.m. the following morning, Friday Nov. 20 at Town Hall. Both the drawing and the manual counting will be open to the public.

This year’s will be the fourth audit of elections in Darien, said Democratic Registrar of Voters Thomas Dunn.

“In the past, we were off one or two in every category,” said Dunn who added he doesn’t suspect Friday’s audit to unearth any discrepancy.

The University of Connecticut has worked closely with the State on the election audit and will help to analyze results of the manual tabulation. Those findings plus details of any discrepancies will be submitted to the State Elections Enforcement Commission, and the data will ultimately be available to the public.

“Connecticut has the toughest elections audit law in the country, and I am confident at the end of this year’s audit the numbers will match.” Bysiewicz said.

It is highly unlikely that even a major discrepancy would alter the outcome of the election, especially in the First Selectman race, where Campbell picked up 70 percent of the vote. Moreover, many of the offices were uncontested.

Connecticut is the first state in New England to require such a comprehensive audit of election results; and for good reason, according to Bysiewicz.

“Auditing election results isn’t just a good idea, it’s absolutely essential in order to guarantee the integrity of our elections,” said Bysiewicz. “We want to make sure that as voters come to the polls and cast ballots in Connecticut they have continued confidence that their votes were recorded accurately.”

Dunn differs in opinion.

“I’ll tell you,” he said “the hand counting is not half as accurate as the machines.”