How the vote changed in Range Lake
Northern News Services
Wednesday, December 2, 2015
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
The only electoral district subject to judicial recount where the vote count changed was Range Lake.
There, previously rejected ballots were deemed acceptable, there was a miscounted ballot and an ineligible voter's ballot was removed from the total.
The moment the official vote changed came as Linda Balsillie, the Range Lake returning officer, was counting the box for poll #6. Votes for each candidate had been separated into two piles.
Mid-way through Cochrane-Johnson's pile she paused and held up a vote for Dolynny, upping his count and lowering hers. The next change was during the counting of poll #2 when a ballot had more of a scribble than an X. The vote was added to Dolynny's total. The box for poll #4 also had a similar case.
"Again, this should have been accepted," Balsillie said. "It's just a happy face on it."
That ballot was accepted for Cochrane-Johnson. Then came a point when several votes were almost missed as a final box containing votes from correctional centres, a mine site and college campuses was examined.
The envelopes for both candidates were marked as if they were empty - no votes. The envelopes would have been marked as such after the count on election day.
Chief electoral officer Nicole Latour held the envelope open to show it was empty but one person noticed a ballot inside. And there was more than just one. There was one for Dolynny and three for Cochrane-Johnson.
After absentees ballots were added to the tally, Justice Andrew Mahar compared his running total with the figures of others in the room. It was 334 to 328.
"I'm happy with it," Cochrane-Johnson said to those she was with. "It was stressful."
She then lost a vote because it was revealed a person had cast a vote in Range Lake but returned to the returning office after realizing he or she wasn't eligible to vote in that district.
The error was admitted in a note the judge read, which stated that person had voted for Cochrane-Johnson. The vote was removed from her count.
Her original count of 335 votes was cut to 333 and Dolynny's grew from 325 to 328. Ballots from 10 polls were re-counted.
