Recount expense criticized
Ohio lawmakers examine new restrictions, costs

By Jim Siegel
Cincinnati Enquirer Columbus Bureau   24 December 2004
CHANGES 

Changes in the margin of victory in ed counties between President Bush and Sen. John Kerry after the recount:

Hamilton County: Bush +32 votes

Warren County: Bush +1

Butler County: Kerry +3

Clermont County: Bush +1

Cuyahoga County: Kerry +23

Franklin County: No change

Source:

Local election boards

COLUMBUS - State lawmakers will look at ways next year to make it harder and more expensive to get election recounts.

Ohio taxpayers are paying up to $1 million for a statewide ballot recount prompted by a pair of presidential candidates who combined to collect 14,881 votes - about 0.3 percent of the total vote.

But to get a statewide recount in Ohio, a candidate only has to appear on the ballot and raise the $10 per precinct fee ($113,600), an amount state election officials say is far less than the actual cost.

Those backing the efforts of Green Party candidate David Cobb and Libertarian Michael Bednarik said they want to ensure every vote in Ohio is counted, particularly after controversies regarding provisional balloting, long lines at the polls and scattered other flaws.

As election boards finished and certify recounts this week, majority Republicans and county officials complain the process is a waste of time and money since President Bush won the state by about 119,000 votes.

"This is an exercise in futility and a ridiculous waste of county tax money," said Larry Long, executive director of the County Commissioners Association of Ohio."Neither candidate has any chance of winning, so what's the point?"

Lawmakers and Secretary of State Ken Blackwell are considering restrictions on who can ask for a recount.

They may also seek a price increase.

Blackwell calls the $10 cost per precinct a "basement bargain price" that has been unchanged since 1956, likely because a candidate has never requested a statewide recount in Ohio.

This year's recount is unlike an automatic recount, which is triggered when the margin of victory falls within 0.25 percent. Ohio last saw such a statewide recount in the 1990 race for attorney general.

Blackwell, the state's top election official and a former Cincinnati mayor, is concerned that those asking for the recount got only a tiny fraction of the vote.

"Allowing them to trigger this enormously detailed process - a process where they're only charged one-tenth of the cost - it's too inviting for mischief," he said.

Election board leaders in the four-county southwest Ohio region said they have not yet tallied the cost of the recount.

Hamilton County hand-counted nearly 13,000 ballots - 3 percent of the total cast - and machine counted the remaining 420,000 as required by law. Director John Williams said the job was done without using overtime, "but I don't know how you analyze the productivity costs for the board."

The office is now behind on filling public record requests related to the election, updating the Web site, and getting ready for the February election, he said.

"It seems to me the purpose of a recount should be to change the election, not an academic exercise," Williams said.

He wants to see the fee increased, and a requirement that a candidate get a certain percentage of the vote, or be within a certain percentage of the leader, before he or she could request a recount.

Those ideas will be under discussion next year, said Rep. Kevin DeWine, R-Fairborn, a House point person on election issues. He is discouraged with how two minor party candidates "with basically no justification and no cause" could force Ohio to spend time and money on a recount.

But he also stressed that any change in law is a balancing act.

"We don't want to create a situation where it becomes so burdensome that a candidate can't get a recount if they are deserving," DeWine said.

"On the other hand, we have to be careful about allowing candidates with mischief on their mind to essentially harass our election officials into doing unnecessary recounts."

But what is unnecessary? Peg Rosenfield, election specialist for the League of Women Voters of Ohio, said that just because a recount won't change election results doesn't mean it's pointless.

Elections are not just about numbers, but also perceptions, she said, noting that the public viewed Ohio's election with paranoia. One way to resolve that is with a recount, she said.

She and Daniel Tokaji, an Ohio State University election law expert, said lawmakers must speed up completing recounts.

Ohio's 20 Republican electors cast their official votes for Bush on Dec. 13, even though final recount totals won't be certified by the state until next week. That scenario, Tokaji said, could spell disaster in a very tight presidential race if the recount somehow reverses the winner. Congress could eventually be forced to decide Ohio.

"Ohio voters would be disenfranchised entirely in a close election," he said.