As Pennsylvania election officials enter their fourth year of dealing with avalanches of mail ballots, one of their big wishes remains unfulfilled: more time to precanvass those ballots.
Tim Benyo, election board chief clerk in Lehigh County, is on the front lines of those seeking more time. Benyo said election directors statewide have sought more time since the 2019 passage of Act 77, the law that introduced widespread mail balloting.
“We need more time to precanvass,” Benyo said.
In Lehigh County, 35,658 of the 137,315 votes cast in the November election were mail ballots, Benyo said. Under current law, precanvassing — inventorying the ballots, opening the envelopes that contain them and putting them through a scanner — cannot start until 7 a.m. on Election Day.
About 29,000 of the 156,332 votes cast in Berks County in the November election were mail ballots, according to official election results.
Other counties also chafe under the restriction.
“Northampton County has conveyed its desire to have at least three days of precanvass to anyone who would listen since the passage of Act 77,” said county Executive Lamont McClure.
Several years of political debate in Harrisburg have failed to produce the desired change. But with a new governor and Legislature, there is hope in 2023.
Democratic House members last week heard testimony from Allegheny County officials, who offered a rundown on the massive scope of election staffers’ work. The county, they said, had 161,497 mail-in or absentee ballots returned and counted in the November election, and about 115 people were ready to start precanvassing when 7 a.m. arrived.
Democratic Rep. Sara Innamorato of Allegheny County said the testimony portrayed staff on Election Day as conducting two elections, one in-person and the other involving precanvassing and then actually tallying mail ballots.
Having extra time to precanvass, Innamorato said, would let workers start to take care of some of those mail-in ballots.
Democratic Rep. Ryan Bizzaro of Erie County said it was likely that precanvassing would be rolled into a broad debate over a variety of election reforms.
Republican Rep. Doyle Heffley of Carbon County sounded a similar sentiment. A number of election integrity issues have to be confronted, he said, and: “It is going to have to be a negotiation. We can work together.”
Heffley and House Republicans spokesman Jason Gottesman noted that former Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf vetoed an election reform package last session that included more precanvassing time. Wolf said at the time that he vetoed the bill because it would create new barriers for voters, including stricter voter ID requirements.
Gottesman said, “We believe a topic like precanvassing should be dealt with in comprehensive election reform legislation that holds true to our priority of updating our election law through accessibility, security, and modernization.”
Election integrity
In 2021, at the start of the last two-year legislative session, the County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania identified more precanvassing time as an election reform priority.
Executive Director Lisa Schaefer said it remains near the top of the list. More time, she said, would create a significant improvement in election integrity and let counties handle resources more efficiently.
Various proposals have sought three, seven and even 21 days of precanvassing time ahead of Election Day.
“As much time as we can reasonably give counties to manage their workload would be helpful,” Schaefer said.
Berks Commissioners Christian Leinbach and Michael Rivera have been vocal about their frustrations over the inability to precanvass mail ballots.
“We have been trying for a while now to tell lawmakers what needs to get done because we know what works, what areas need to be improved on,” Rivera said following the 2021 general election. “The legislators don’t know. They’re not here. They don’t come visit the election office and ask what can be done to make sure elections run smoother.”
While there have been dozens of bills introduced in Harrisburg to address all kinds of the election issues, the County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania have called for legislators to focus specifically on two areas: give counties additional time to process mailed ballots and move the deadline for mailed ballot applications back to 15 days prior to an election.
Rivera said there are many issues that could be addressed but that a simple bill making these two fixes would resolve a significant portion of the challenges counties have experienced.
“Are those the only two things that need attention? Definitely not but at least it’s a start,” he said. “I know for sure that early canvassing would help cut down on that skepticism that some have about races changing or getting closer after the mailed ballots are finally counted.”
Leinbach has said he’s frustrated that there has been no action taken on legislation calling for permission for counties to begin the process of opening those mailed ballots before Election Day.
“The Legislature and the governor need to get their act together,” he said a few months before the 2021 general election. “They need to stop expecting counties to just kind of figure it out as they go and then letting counties get kicked in the teeth because they have to make their own decisions on these things. It’s just very frustrating.”
Meanwhile, Schaefer’s hope — and that of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle — is that Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, will add to a new dynamic to the discussion.
Shapiro has not made any declarative statements on election reform since taking office. In his campaign, though, he made it clear precanvassing was on his radar.
Specifically, then-candidate Shapiro said he would “sign legislation, enabling and funding the preprocessing and precanvassing of mail-in ballots, following the example of 17 states – including Ohio, North Carolina and Arizona – and recommendations of the County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania and legislative leaders from both parties.”
Benyo is a member of a committee of election officials advising the commissioners association.
A large portion of election directors want more precanvassing time, he said. Many discussions cite the desired period as being three days.
But, he said, “Any additional time would be greatly helpful.”
(Reading Eagle reporter Karen Shuey contributed to this story.)
Source: Berkshire mont
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