District 61 race still undecided; ballots to get another look

Judge orders “under votes” to be tallied

It will be sometime next week when we have a more definitive idea of who won the race for Colorado House District 61. While Republican Luke Korkowski has conceded in the race for the seat, to whom the concession will ultimately be remains up in the air.

Democrat Roger Wilson currently leads write-in candidate Kathleen Curry of Gunnison by just under 500 votes. But a judge has ordered that the so-called “under votes” be included in the official tally—and that could put Curry over the top.
The ballots must officially be certified November 26. At the end of election night last week, Curry had 9,001 votes, trailing Wilson by 495 votes. There are 2,001 under votes. Under votes are those ballots where the House District 61 space was either left blank or had a name written in but did not have the box checked off. That race was on the ballot in five counties, so each county will do a separate new count of the ballots.
Originally, secretary of state Bernie Buescher had decided the under votes would be counted only in a recount. But Denver district judge John Madden ruled last Friday that the under votes must be inspected and any clear votes for Curry added to her vote count.
Buescher could have appealed the ruling but decided against that move.
In an email announcement sent out Tuesday, Curry stated, “Four of the five clerks in my house district are planning to conduct the additional counting of the 2,000 ‘under voted’ ballots this coming Monday and Tuesday. (Hinsdale has already completed their inspection.) So far the work of the clerks, their staff and the judges has been very professional and thorough, and I know that their work next week will also be fair.”
Here in Gunnison County, the new count will start Monday morning at 9 o’clock. Election official Diane Folowell said they are ready. “We have six election judges, three Republicans and three Democrats, that will participate,” she explained. “They will go through all the paper ballots that were cast in the election to separate the 425 under votes in that race that were cast in this county. Then we will do a hand-count. It will just be a matter of coming up with the numbers.
“They’ll be looking for
where her name was written in but the box not marked,” Folowell continued. “The name has to be in the appropriate box. It won’t count if, for example, [Curry’s] name is in the place for the state senate race. We have a voter intent guide furnished by the state and the judges will follow that. So for example if just [Curry’s] last name is there, it will count. If someone spelled Curry with a K, it will count. We hope we will know the final result from all the counties Tuesday evening. We want to be very careful so we only have to do this once.”
Curry said she is confident an accurate count will be garnered. “I plan to have watchers present to make sure that the counting process reflects the direction from the court,” her email stated. “Although watchers now have to be at least six feet away from the work of the judges (per a new ruling from the Sec. of State), I am very confident that I will ultimately get an accurate count of the ballots that have my name on them but lack a filled in box.
“I sincerely appreciate the efforts of the county clerks to implement this order and revise my vote count accordingly!” the Curry statement said.
Folowell said that if the vote difference between the two candidates were one-half of one percent, an automatic recount would be triggered and paid for by the state. It is estimated that the magic number is 47 votes.
Harvie Branscomb, Democratic chairman for House District 61, told the Denver Post on Sunday that all the ballots in the race should be recounted by hand, not just the 2,000 or so under votes for Curry that were thrown out because of Buescher’s ruling.
“I’m quite … opposed to partially recounting the contest,” Branscomb told the Post. “I really don’t think it’s fair for the court to say that the vote count can only go up for Kathleen Curry but it can’t go up for any other candidate.”
But for the moment, only write-in votes will be added to the tally. If the one-half of one percent threshold is not met, either Curry or the Democrats could ask for a recount of the ballots but they would have to pick up the tab.
Curry said she feels good about the election and the process. “As far as I’m concerned we already won because we ran a campaign that was not negative, relied on small local campaign donations, and focused on the issues. I know it is going to be close,” Curry summarized.