Feb 4, 2008 6:43 pm US/Eastern
California's Super Tuesday Results May Be Late
SACRAMENTO (CBS) ―
It's the biggest California primary in recent memory, but announcing a winner may take longer than expected. Several problems could slow the release of the California election results on Super Tuesday, possibly by as much as one or two weeks.
Some counties are pointing the finger at the Secretary of State.
"We don't want national reporters blaming California counties for delaying the voting," said Paul McIntosh of the California State Association of Counties.
The problem goes back six months, when Secretary of State Debra Bowen pulled the plug on three different types of electronic voting machines and required counties to secure a backup voting system. Counties didn't have enoguh
McIntosh says that California's results will be accurate, but slow.
"It could be the rest of this week or into next week before we get a final tally," he said.
"You can gripe at me a bit if we're slow, but if I get it wrong, you'll never forgive me," said Secretary of State Bowen.
She didn't give a direct answer when I asked if it could really take two weeks to get it all done, but she said the transition from touch-screen voting means that they're just going back to paper ballots.
"We already had about three-quarters of California's voters voting that way," she said. "The change is much more minor than some people would make it out to be."
It's not a problem here in Sacramento because we don't use electronic voting machines, but we have issues of our own. A couple weeks ago, the precinct scanners -- where you feed your ballot -- were tested for accuracy, and the results were mixed. The local election officials pulled the plug.
Now all ballots from 548 polling places have to be collected and driven down to the county office where they will be scanned on a bigger machine. The delay in Sacramento County is expected to be five to ten hours late.
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