Attendees of the latest Greater Plant City Chamber of Commerce luncheon, held on April 14, had the opportunity to get more insight on how votes are processed.
Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections Craig Latimer was the keynote speaker for the event, held at the Arthur Boring Building, and offered information on the election system as it pertains to the county.
He was elected as supervisor in November 2012, took office in January 2013 and is now serving his third term.
He is the past president of the Florida Supervisor of Elections and the first supervisor of elections to receive the Governor’s Sterling Award, the highest award for performance excellence in Florida. He also served as chief of staff to the supervisor of elections, received his official designation as a certified elections and registration administrator, and is currently on the Election Center’s Security Task Force.
He served in law enforcement for 35 years and retired as a major from the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office in 2008.
During the presentation, Latimer explained how the county fared during the 2020 election.
“We normally average about a 70 to 72% turnout for a presidential election. We were 77%,” he said. “We had a lot of people who voted, and it was interesting times because of the pandemic.”
Several days before the March 17, 2020 presidential primary in Florida, it was announced that the first two confirmed COVID-19 deaths in the state occurred in Sarasota County and Hillsborough County.
On the day of the primary election, 390 concerned poll workers decided not to show up at the polling stations.
Leading up to the general election, the Tampa Bay sports teams: the Buccaneers, the Rays and the Lightning, all took to social media to encourage employers to allow their employees to have a day off to vote or work the polling stations.
As a result, more than enough people volunteered to work the polls and approximately 2,900 others had to be turned away.
Also, the average age for a poll worker dropped from 66 to 55. Hillsborough County is currently the fourth largest state in terms of registered voters – over 900,000, Latimer said.
He expects that number to increase to one million by the 2024 election.
“Florida actually came out to be the shining star on election night and it was many years of work that got us here,” Latimer said. “The secretary of state actually made a great statement that if you voted in Florida, no matter what method you voted, you can rest assured your vote was counted, and it was counted accurately.”
During the past presidential election, Hillsborough County had about 85% of its voters vote prior to election day, he said.
By law, Florida can start counting vote-by-mail ballots as early as 22 days before the election. If requesting a mail ballot, voters will now have to include their driver’s license, or ID, or the last four digits of their social security number.
Drop boxes are another method of turning in ballots. They will be watched by at least two poll workers and will only be used for early voting, Latimer said.
His four offices will also be an alternative way of casting early ballots.
U.S. citizens who live abroad as well as active military officers who don’t have an official address in Hillsborough County, can use those offices to mark down as an address when voting.
The Florida Supervisors of Elections Association is made up of the supervisor of elections of all 67 counties and works along with the state legislature to make it easier to vote, harder to cheat, and allows them ample time to get returns in early, Latimer said.
“By law, I have to have the early vote uploaded the Monday before the election, so that at 7:05 on election morning, we’re releasing the total numbers of vote-by-mail, and early votes that we already have,” he said, adding that the county has successful results due in part to the use of paper ballots.
Poll sites close at 7 p.m. on election day for same day voting.
Latimer serves on a canvassing board along with two county judges that conducts a public logic accuracy test. In this process, sample ballots are used to test the efficiency of tabulators – scanning machines that read and record how ballots are marked. Not only does it deposit the ballot, it also stores the information and produces election results at the polling stations.
Tabulators are highly sensitive as they can detect any marking outside of the box.
When doing the vote-by-mail route, discrepancies are occasionally found with ballots. However, high-speed scanners are used when multiple candidates are marked. The scanners will sort them so the canvassing board can review them to determine the voter’s choices.
When voting in person, the screen will notify that individual that too many candidates have been selected and they can request a new ballot on site.
By law, each county has to do a post-election audit.
Latimer’s office is required to do a 20% audit on all the ballots, but he chooses to do 100%.
One way of doing so is for the canvass board to collect ballots from various precincts and hand count all of them to make sure that the tabulators didn’t make any mistakes.
Another method is using a different type of tabulator system to recount the ballots.
“We basically take every single ballot that’s been through a tabulator, either in an early vote site, election day… and run them back through the other system to once again ensure that the system is counting the votes correctly,” Latimer said. “There’s been all this chatter out there. Misinformation basically about doing audits. We do an audit after every single election. Anybody can come to it and watch it. We’re constantly, constantly auditing ballots.”
Florida is one of 32 states that is a part of the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC) to determine whether a voter is stilling living within the county they are registered in or have moved elsewhere. This is done by a mega computer system that takes driver’s license information and other voting information to track that individual. This system will also find out whether a voter has passed away in their home state or elsewhere.
In addition, those who vote in more than one state are flagged and that dilemma is then turned over to law enforcement.
And if the ballots that the supervisor of elections office sends to voters come back as undeliverable, those voters will go from active to inactive.
Those inactive voters who don’t vote or contact the office for two election cycles will become ineligible.
Plans are currently underway to do reprecincting – adjusting the precinct lines. This is dictated by the redistricting the electoral boundaries on the state’s map, which has yet to be signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Because of redistricting, voters have to be given a new voter information card this year, Latimer said. It will show the voters’ district plus their designated polling site, which they must go to if they vote on Election Day.”
Those who don’t vote by mail will still receive a sample ballot with their information.
For more information on Hillsborough County’s voting procedures, visit www.VoteHillsborough.gov/.