CANYON CITY — Grant County election workers began the process of counting the vote on Tuesday, Nov. 5, under the watchful gaze of Millie Lysne and Karen Jacobs.

Lysne, a Republican, and Jacobs, a Democrat, are election observers, and it’s their job to keep an eye on the process to make sure everything is done by the book. Other pairs of election observers from the two major parties were scheduled to work in shifts throughout the day.

On Tuesday morning, Jacobs and Lysne sat side by side in the lobby of the Grant County Clerk’s Office, where ballots were being collected for tabulation. They kept tabs on the proceedings by means of a video monitor, which showed various parts of the office by over a split-screen feed.

Jacobs pointed to one part of the screen that showed election workers opening and sorting ballots to get them ready for counting by the tallying machine.

Lysne pointed out that, while she and her fellow poll-watcher represent different political parties to ensure fairness, there is nothing adversarial about their relationship.

“We’re not fighting, we’re together,” she said. “We’re just here to observe.”

In Oregon, ballots for the November general election were mailed out to most voters starting on Oct. 16 (or earlier for military members, overseas residents and Oregon voters with out-of-state mailing addresses), and they’ve been flowing into county elections offices ever since.

In Grant County, elections are under the purview of County Clerk Laurie Cates, who reported that everything was flowing smoothly on Election Day.

“So far, so good,” she said around 4:30 p.m.

Cates said all the ballots that were mailed in or dropped off early were kept in a secure location in her office until Election Day, when the counting process could begin.

“They were held and locked up until this morning, when they were opened and run through the (tallying) machine,” she said.

When the polls close at 8 p.m., Cates said, the remaining ballots received during the day would be counted and the preliminary results would be posted on her website, https://grantcountyoregon.net/157/Clerk, and another site run by the Oregon Secretary of State’s Office, https://results.oregonvotes.gov/.

Under Oregon law, mail-in ballots postmarked by Election Day can still be counted if they are received and accepted by 5 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 12.

The results of the election are not official until all of those ballots have been counted and certified by county elections officials. The last day to certify the election is Dec. 2.

In addition to mailing or hand-delivering their ballots to the clerk’s office inside the county courthouse, Grant County voters can also use one of the county’s two drop boxes, one in the hallway outside the clerk’s office and the other outside the county jail. Both are under video surveillance by the Grant County Sheriff’s Office, Cates said. 

There are a number of other measures in place to ensure that elections in Grant County are fair and secure, Cate said.

For instance, the job of sorting, scanning and tallying ballots is conducted in the presence of the Grant County Election Board, which is composed of three people representing three different political parties. The current members are Brenda Percy, Rachelle Simmons and Crish Hamilton.

“When the ballots come in, we scan and verify every single signature that comes through,” Cates added.

Signatures are verified by Cates and Deputy Clerk Joleen Moulton, who are trained to spot potential problems. If a signature doesn’t match the one on file with the clerk’s office, the ballot is marked for challenge and set aside. The registered voter whose name appears on the ballot is contacted and given a chance to confirm that they did in fact mark and sign the ballot themselves.

“Everything’s under video surveillance and being recorded throughout the entire election,” Cates said. “There are two sets of eyes on everything.”

She noted that the automated tallying machine used to count the votes is not connected to the internet, so it can’t be hacked, and is checked multiple times to make sure it’s working properly.

“We run several different tests on the tallying machine before the election” using something called a test deck, Cates said.

“At the end of the election we run it through again … to make sure it’s still reading accurately.”

On top of that, the Oregon Secretary of State’s Office contacts county elections offices after the election and designates one precinct in each county for a spot-check. Local elections officials will hand-count all the ballots from that precinct to make sure the results match what the automated tallying machine came up with.

That entire process, Cates said, is handled locally.

“Our ballots never leave our office,” she said. “They’re not shipped out of here — they remain here.”