Election petition

A petition signed by 21 municipal election candidates to conduct manual audits of four randomly selected polling stations to ensure accuracy of vote tabulators was submitted to city clerk John Hannam Tuesday.

"I think it’s important we put people’s minds at ease that these machines are 100 per cent reliable," said Current River candidate Andy Wolff, who spearheaded the initiative.

Wolff was joined at city hall to submit the petition by a handful of other candidates.

However, Hannam said it’s too late to do anything about it. Under the Municipal Elections Act the city is required to establish procedures relating to election conduct by June 1.

"The only way, at this stage of the game, would be for them to make an application after the election for a recount…and have a justice order a recount and further order the recount to be conducted manually," he said, adding there also has to be grounds for a recount in the first place.

In 2003, a recount application was filed and while a justice denied the request, they suggested the city do a manual audit of their vote tabulators in the next election.

"In 2006, we did perform an audit of four randomly selected pools – supervised by the city’s external audit firm," Hannam said. "And found the tabulators performed with 100 per cent accuracy, which was no surprise to us."

A deputation was made by Wolff earlier in the year asking to switch to a hand-count system for the Oct. 25 election but council choose to continue to use the electronic tabulators.

While Wolff said people have told him they don’t vote because they don’t trust the machines, Hannam said there is no evidence to suggest the tabulators are unreliable.

The city did test the machines and Hannam said invitations to view the tests were sent to all candidates and an ad was posted to the general public.

"Two candidates and one of our election day staff is all that attended," he said. "The gentlemen that were here today all received a letter inviting them to observe the testing of the tabulators. They chose not to attend."