Irwin County elections office finds high volunteer error rate in post-election audit; staff weigh bylaw changes

Waymond Harris, chairman of the Irwin County Board of Elections & Registrations, opened the June 11 meeting where staff presented results from a post-election audit of the May 21 election.

Ethan Compton, election supervisor, said volunteers hand-audited nine contests and that "8 of the 9 audited contests had an error of some kind." He reported that 27 of 40 audited batches contained at least one error — a batch error rate of 67.5% — and cited an example in which the School Board District 4 contest showed a percent difference from reported results of more than 13% in a batch where auditors had omitted contests.

To resolve discrepancies, Supervisor Compton recounted all ballots using the high-definition images scanned and published on May 28. "This count was a true and perfect match of the records as reported by the election system," he told the board, and said the recount was then verified using optical character recognition comparisons of those same images.

Compton said those results illustrated why shifting to exclusively hand-counting ballots could produce "less secure, less accurate elections," though he still recommended extensive post-election hand auditing "to confirm accurate setup, use and to discover any potential tampering."

The board discussed legal constraints after the Legislature amended state law. Members referenced HB 974 (amending O.C.G.A. § 21-2-498, effective May 6), which allows election superintendents to audit additional contests "if circumstances warrant." Staff warned that conducting audits beyond the procedures established in state law without objective justification could create legal exposure.

To address that tension, Compton presented two options: (1) follow state procedures exactly — limiting audits to selected batches and typically to two contests — or (2) amend the board's bylaws to create a standardized, objective set of circumstances (for example, a defined margin threshold or documented physical evidence) that would permit auditing additional contests. A proposed draft bylaw amendment was made available for review and possible consideration at the July meeting.

Guest Wyatt Thompson asked whether county parties could be allowed to add contests to an additional audit by mutual agreement of both county parties; Compton said he doubted whether that would meet a sufficiently objective standard. Vice-Chair Charlene Hutchinson suggested raising a proposed margin threshold from 4% to 10% to determine when additional auditing would be triggered.

The board did not take a final vote on bylaws at the meeting. The discussion concluded with the draft bylaw to be reviewed and amendments suggested ahead of the July meeting.