A “system glitch” during the first two days of early voting ended up in thousands of people getting the wrong ballots, according to city and county officials. The Dallas City Council questioned the ballot totals on Tuesday while it was scheduled to fulfill its legal obligation to accept the election results.
The glitch resulted in nearly 4,000 "people that are all over Dallas County, that in one way or another got a ballot that was not the ballot for their precinct,” according to Dallas County Elections Administrator Heider Garcia.
Garcia said the county does not track individual ballots, but knows how many people are registered at a precinct and who actually show up to vote. Garcia's figure comes from that difference.
As a result, some Dallas residents could have received a ballot with no city charter amendments — while others outside of city limits may have got one with them included. Garcia said less than 2,000 of those people were within city of Dallas precincts.
The glitch was “in multiple precincts and it was common across the county,” Dallas City Secretary Billierae Johnson told the council.
Dallas residents were asked to weigh in on 18 city charter amendments. That includes at least two controversial propositions that were approved and will significantly change the way local government operates.
While most propositions were approved or denied with wide margins, some ballot measures — like two controversial city charter amendments — were narrowly approved. Proposition U, which requires the city to hire hundreds more police officers and divert some excess revenue to public safety, passed by just over 3,000 votes.
“Does the council have the legal authority to decline to acknowledge the election on a proposition where the margin that vote was less than 3,960 votes, in light of the testimony of Mr. Garcia?” District 14 Council Member Paul Ridley asked.
Tammy Palomino, the city’s attorney, told the council that its ministerial duty is “to accept the canvassing today,” regardless of the information Garcia provided about the first days of early voting.
Garcia wanted to provide more clarity about the thousands of wrong ballots.
“I understand that it is obvious we had an issue...and that created a ripple effect,” Garcia said. “But I do want to be careful with using the word counts not being accurate, there is no issue with counting the ballots.”
Still, some council members wanted to know the options for challenging the election results — even if the city itself couldn’t.
“If you’re asking me who may petition a recount of ballots, it’s the campaign treasure of a specific purpose political committee that was involved in the election, or 25 or more persons,” Palomino told the council.
The city is under intense scrutiny to comply with Proposition U and another measure passed on election night that leaves the city open to a wide range of lawsuits for violating the charter, ordinances, or state laws.
Both amendments were added to the ballot by a group called Dallas HERO. Key figures in the group have been accused in taking part in the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol — and at least one of its donors has been linked to other conservative political movements in Texas.
Since the amendment passed, the city has voted to repeal a police-to-resident ratio mandate — likely to shield itself from litigation under the new charter amendment — and Moody’s Investor Service downgraded the city’s credit outlook from “stable to negative” because of Proposition U.
The city council voted to accept the election outcomes, but at least one member wanted to know what the remedy for these types of issues are.
“Per the conversation I had with the elections administrator, there is no cure for this type of issue,” Johnson said during the meeting.
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