Canvass panel wraps election count

Art Swannack and Dean Kinzer will officially be Whitman County’s new commissioners next January, after the Nov. 8 general election count was certified Tuesday.

Final count gave Swannack, a Republican farmer and rancher from the Lamont area, 6,922 votes, or 54 percent to the 5,493 votes cast for Rosalia Fire Chief Bill Tensfeld, also a Republican, which was 43 percent. Kinzer, a GOP farmer from the Ewartzville area, received 9,106 votes, or 59 percent, to top incumbent Pat O’Neill, a Democrat from Johnson, who received 6,175 votes, or 40 percent.

A total of 17,429 voters returned their ballots to Whitman County elections office; good for 82 percent turnout from the 21,272 ballots issued.

The county’s election canvass board met Monday and Tuesday to review challenged ballots before Tuesday’s certification deadline.

A count last Wednesday, Nov. 21, added 6,960 votes to election night returns of 10,363.

One election night result which changed with the late counts was outcome of the Referendum 74, the same sex marriage proposal. It had 48.6 approval in the election night returns, passed the 50 percent mark after the Nov. 15 count and finished with a 50.66 approval rate, 8,554 to 8,330 after certification.

The slim edge held by the marijuana initiative on election night held up on the final count, ending at 51.99 percent with 8,844 in favor and 8,330 against.

Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney carried the county with 49 percent of the vote at 8,507 to President Barack Obama’s 8,037 votes, good for 47 percent. Obama won the state and national elections.

In total, the canvass board rejected 1,182 of the 1,333 ballots flagged for review.

The canvass board approved 130 ballots which were challenged because signatures on the ballot did not appear to match signatures on the voter’s registration file. The board sided with election workers in rejecting 98 ballots because of signatures.

Another 937 ballots were rejected because they were returned as undeliverable. Voters were no longer at the address on file at the election office and a change of address was never delivered.

Another 71 were rejected because voters did not sign their ballots. Forty-four were rejected because they were postmarked after the Nov. 6 election day.