MANATEE COUNTY (WSNN) – Just 49 days till the general election and Manatee County is still receiving Vote By Mail ballots from the primaries. And the sole blame doesn’t fall on the post office.
“People actually dated and signed them after the election,” Supervisor of Elections, Michael Bennett, said.
Two days after the primaries, about a thousand ballots went uncounted for in Manatee County. Now, Bennett says it’s about 1400.
“There’s no excuse for somebody who’s signed and dated, they dated it, their ballot, long after the election was over, we’re going on 30 days now,” Bennett said.
You can’t blame the post office. Bennett says late is late.
“You have to draw the line someday, you’ve gotta say it’s late,” Bennett said.
Signatures are also a problem. 85 were rejected because Bennett couldn’t verify them. So, he encourages you to update yours. Bradenton residents, Gerald and Jacqueline Spierenvurg are doing just that.
“It hadn’t been done for several years,” Jacqueline said.
So, Jacqueline is updating hers. For this upcoming election.
“If we contact you and there’s an issue with your signature and you didn’t sign the ballot, please follow up the affidavit, and get it back here, so we can count your vote,” Bennett said.
Mail-in-ballot coordinator, Pamela Smaridge says the focus this election is voter responsibility.
“We work very hard to contact voters, to make sure their ballots get counted if at all possible, if they have various errors, but this is an error we can’t correct, there’s nothing we can about this, and that’s frustrating for the people who work here,” Smaridge said.
Bradenton Resident, James Wilder, says he plans to vote-by-mail.
“After working the polls as a poll worker, I think Manatee county is – I’m not concerned at all about voter fraud,” Wilder said.
If you plan to vote-by-mail in this upcoming election, don’t wait. As Bennett says ‘Late is late.’ He told me they planning on sending out more than 125,000 mail-in-ballots in the next few weeks.
Bennett says they send out ballots to the military 45 days in advance, and for everyone else, about 35 days in advance.
