City Council Meeting Date: November 13, 2018
To: Mayor and City Council
City Administrator
From: Deb Little, City Clerk
Subject:
TITLE
Approve Abstract of Votes Cast at the November 6, 2018 General Election.
BODY
Action Requested:
The Northfield City Council is being asked to adopt the attached resolution approving the abstract of votes cast at the November 6, 2018 City General Election.
Summary Report:
The General Election was held on Tuesday, November 6, 2018. County officials are still working on reviewing and preparing the official results and election abstracts. This information will be distributed through a supplemental memo on Tuesday.
Unofficial election results for local races are as follows:
|
|
# of Votes |
|
Council Member At-Large |
|
|
Clarice Grabau |
5,095 |
|
Greg Colby |
3,395 |
|
Council Member - Ward 1 |
|
|
Suzie Nakasian |
2,271 |
|
Council Member - Ward 4 |
|
|
Jessica Peterson White |
1,246 |
|
Jon Denison |
336 |
|
City Referendum Question |
|
|
Yes |
4,358 |
|
No |
5,421 |
Staff and the election judges work very hard to ensure that the elections are conducted in a fair and impartial way. Staff deployed approximately 200 pieces of election related equipment for the election. There were over 120 judges serving in our eight polling locations. Our first precinct reported back to City Hall by 8:55 pm and all eight Northfield precincts reported to City Hall by 9:45 pm. This is an amazing response time given the extremely busy Election Day. Before the lead judges report back to City Hall, they have completed all their election night closing activities, which includes modeming results so they can be paired with the absentee voting results and immediately reported on the Secretary of State results page, completing a large amount of paperwork and balancing activities, as well as packing up and securing the location. Staff received notice from Rice County at approximately 10:00 pm that there were technical issues that would require data from our polling locations to be driven to Faribault for manual entry. This required additional work from our lead judges and staff. This was not an issue isolated to Northfield and affected all but three precincts in Rice County. County staff is investigating the issue. I will provide additional information when I receive it from Rice County.
Absentee voting started on September 21. Early voting started on Tuesday, October 30 and continued to 5:00 p.m. on Monday, November 5. During early voting, voters place their ballots directly into a ballot counter. City of Northfield voters cast 2,839 ballots using the absentee/early voting process. There were 2,755 absentee ballots cast in the 2016 election.
In addition to serving as an absentee/early voting location for City of Northfield residents, our location also serves as the Northern Service Center for Rice County allowing any Rice County voter to come to this location. Here are a few absentee/early voting statistics for the Northfield absentee/early voting location:
|
Total Voters for the 6 week period |
2,208 |
|
Voters during the early voting period (10/30-11/5) |
1,014 |
|
Voters on Monday, November 5 |
278 |
In addition to City staff, the City also hired two temporary part-time employees Marsha DeGroot and Mary Olson. This is possible through an agreement with Rice County to staff the absentee voting office for a large majority of the six weeks the office was open. Not only did these temporary employees do an amazing job of processing 2,208 voters, they both also serve as lead judges on Election Day.