Critics rip elections supervisor after miscount in West Palm Beach race

707 more votes found after recheck in West Palm race

By Mark Hollis

Palm Beach County elections officials said Friday they are investigating why they failed to quickly count more than 700 votes in a special election that marked the county's first experience with optical scanners.

A 707-vote disparity between an unofficial vote tally Tuesday and a final count two days later in a West Palm Beach City Commission race has spawned another wave of criticism and questions about Supervisor of Elections Arthur Anderson's ability to run an error-free election.

Unofficial results reported a few hours after the election showed 4,085 votes cast. The next day, a computerized audit signaled a problem — three vote-counting machines apparently had collected votes that weren't counted.

On Wednesday, officials rechecked the three machines and re-ran their vote-counting "cartridges" through vote tabulating equipment. The recheck found the 707 additional votes, or 14 percent of the total cast, that had not been counted on election night.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/palmbeach/sfl-flpsnafu0628pnjun28,0,3240328.story