Two absentee and two provisional ballots were verified by the Porter County Election Board on Friday, bringing the official total of the May 4 primary elections to 15,891 votes.

All four additional ballots were Democratic tickets. From the two provisional ballots -- ballots that had been challenged by a poll judge for reasons such as the voter did not have proper identification, was not on the precinct poll lists, or if the voter does not currently reside in that precinct -- one ballot was cast in Center Twp. Precinct 7 and the other was cast in Portage Twp. Precinct 3.

Voters Registration Democratic director Kathy Kozuszek said there were nine provisional ballots declared in the election, but just two voters complied with providing the voters registration office with the proper documentation to confirm their registration as a voter. Voters who cast provisional ballots had ten days after the election, or until noon last Friday, to prove to the election board they are eligible to vote.

Westchester Twp. Precinct 16 garnered one additional absentee ballot as did Center Twp. Precinct 3 which was a federal ballot.

The four additional ballots did not overturn any of the race results.

The percentage of voter turnout was down by nearly five percent since the previous non-presidential election. In Porter County, 15.35 percent of the 103,541 registered voters partook in the May 4 elections. A count of 7,730 Democrats and 8,035 Republicans were tallied.

Board President and Democratic member J.J. Stankiewicz said voter turnout was down across the state with hardly any counties overreaching 20 percent.

Election board member and County Clerk Pamela Mishler Fish said presidential primaries bring out more voters but local elections have a bigger impact on county residents.

At its next meeting, the board plans to discuss whether or not it will initiate a fee for printouts of documents that citizen’s can request at the voter registration office. The board, however, may decide to have citizens bring a CD to copy documents more than five pages onto a disc in order to save on printing costs.

Fish said the proposed option is applicable for it does not deny any citizen access to information.

Posted 5/17/2010