Even after mail-in ballot problems, Iron County still had 60% voter turnout

"I Voted" stickers in the Iron County Clerk's office, Parowan, Utah, Nov. 4, 2022 | Photo by Jeff Richards, St. George News / Cedar City News

CEDAR CITY — Even after a series of delays involving misdirected mail and other issues, Iron County’s voter turnout for the 2022 midterm elections ended up being just over 60%.

Early voting at Iron County Courthouse in Parowan, Utah, Nov. 4, 2022 | Photo by Jeff Richards, St. George News / Cedar City News

Iron County Clerk Jonathan Whittaker presented the final canvass totals for approval during Monday’s special meeting of the Iron County Commission. The three commissioners then unanimously voted to approve the results.

According to the initial Election Night results sent out on Nov. 8, Iron County had 13,200 votes cast out of 29,065 registered voters, a 45.42% turnout. However, in the days that followed, another 4,000-plus outstanding ballots were received, verified and added to the total. The county’s final ballot count was 17,461, or a turnout of 60.08%.

That’s in line with the rest of the state, which was tracking at around 62% turnout, according to a Nov. 16 tweet by Lt. Gov. Diedre Henderson.

None of the outcomes of any of the races on Iron County’s ballots changed between Election Night and the final results, as the winning candidates’ percentages remained essentially the same. To view Iron County’s final results summary, as ratified by the commission earlier this week, click here.

Whittaker said Iron County’s numbers would likely have been higher had there not been issues with the ballots being significantly delayed during the sorting and delivery process. He and the commissioners discussed the issues during the regular county commission meeting the week before, on Nov. 14.

As previously reported in Cedar City News, many of Iron County’s ballots did not start showing up in voters’ mailboxes until after Oct. 28, more than a week after than their target delivery date.

Early voting at Iron County Courthouse in Parowan, Utah, Nov. 4, 2022 | Photo by Jeff Richards, St. George News / Cedar City News

Whittaker explained that one of the main problems involved a mislabeled pallet of election mail that ended up sitting in a warehouse for several days after initially being rejected by the post office. He said the pallet is believed to have included 16 trays Cedar City ballots, four trays of Parowan ballots and eight trays of Carbon County ballots.

“They were not labeled as ballots and they were not given priority as they should have been,” Whittaker said. “And what’s worse, is we didn’t know about it until the 28th. One of my biggest frustrations is that we weren’t made aware of how serious our situation was until the 28th, because we would have taken action sooner had we known.”

Whittaker said his office responded to the situation by extending early voting hours at selected locations in Parowan, Cedar City and other areas. Several methods were used to notify voters, including sending out emergency notification emails, reaching out to local and statewide media outlets and even deploying flashing messages on portable road signs.

Midterm election night at Cedar City Council chambers, Cedar City, Utah, Nov. 8, 2022 | Photo by Jeff Richards, St. George News

Whittaker also expressed his appreciation for the county’s poll workers, many of whom worked 18 days in a row up to and including Election Day. One of them was Carolyn Jones, who he said has been an election worker for 50 years.

“Those folks really are my heroes,” Whittaker said, calling them “the defenders of democracy.”

The last big push that got Iron County above the 60% threshold for voter turnout came on Election Day, Whittaker noted.

“Sixty percent of the votes on election night were in-person votes, and that’s in a county that’s been vote by mail now for six years. That’s how many people turned out. That’s how much people made an effort,” Whittaker said.

Whittaker said the lieutenant governor’s office told him that the the series of ballot sorting and distribution problems that Iron County experienced was “one of the worst-case scenarios” that can happen. Nevertheless, he said state election officials told him the incident serves as a blueprint for how to properly respond such a situation.

Whittaker also noted that officials at Pitney Bowes, the sorting facility where the ballot mailing problems originated, have agreed to make things right by reimbursing Iron County for the extra costs incurred.

“Early on, I said, ‘Listen, we’re gonna have a lot of overages. I don’t think it’s fair that my taxpayers should have to pay for our extra expenses for this election,'” Whittaker told the commissioners. “And so ,they’ve committed to at least $10,000 to help offset our extra expenses. I actually think that will cover most of it. (They’ve) committed to do more if necessary.”

Early voting at Iron County Courthouse in Parowan, Utah, Nov. 4, 2022 | Photo by Jeff Richards, St. George News / Cedar City News

Iron County Commissioner Paul Cozzens said that he appreciated the efforts that Whittaker and his staff made to handle the situation.

Cozzens said he would like to see a return to in-person voting as the default method, while still allowing mail-in ballots to be used by voters who request them.

“I’ve never liked mail-in ballots,” Cozzens said during the Nov. 14 meeting. “I like the old system where you call and request an absentee ballot if you need one. And I think you should be given that for any reason.”

Cozzens said that in a recent meeting he attended, “The majority of that group wanted to go back to our old system of voting in person with an ID. I’ve talked to Rex Shipp, our representative, and he’s in favor of supporting that.”

Such a move would require further amending Utah’s election laws, as the state switched to default mail-in voting in every county with the passage of HB 36 in 2020.

Cozzens said he spoke to one particular property manager who said he has to deal many unusable mail-in ballots each election.

“Every year, he gets a stack of ballots that were floating around, that were mailed to students who’ve moved over the year before,” Cozzens said. “I’m not sure that’s healthy, to be mailing ballots out to hundreds, if not thousands, of people that have moved.”

Copyright St. George News, SaintGeorgeUtah.com LLC, 2022, all rights reserved.

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