Vancouver Sun

NOT EXACTLY MADE-FOR-TV

Mail-in ballots delay election drama

- LORI CULBERT lculbert@postmedia.com

When you turn on your favourite TV network tonight to tune into the provincial election results, you won't see the usual images of celebratin­g candidates being mobbed by hundreds of cheering supporters.

During this pandemic election, you may instead see a few elbow bumps as candidates celebrate with a tiny group of masked friends.

But the most important change is the networks may not be able to project winners in several ridings — or who will form the government — because nearly 725,000 British Columbians requested mail-in ballots, which are not counted on election night.

“When you take a look at the breakdown of ridings across B.C. and the number of mail-in ballots requested, there are going to be likely some ridings that might be too close to call,” said Treena Wood, news director of CBC British Columbia.

“It's a weird election in the middle of a pandemic, and this is the situation we're faced with.”

As the TV cameras roll this evening, behind the scenes Elections B.C. officials will begin weeks of unpreceden­ted activity to try to get the final results tallied by Nov. 16, but that deadline couldn't be guaranteed on Friday. That's because, in the midst of a pandemic, 480,000 British Columbians had mailed in their ballots as of Thursday evening — a 7,200 per cent increase over 2017. And that number was expected to “increase significan­tly” by tonight, B.C.'S top elections official said, as his staff will be in the Canada Post sorting facility in Richmond until 8 p.m. to ensure they've collected as many mail-in ballots as possible.

In addition, a record 681,000 British Columbians cast advance ballots this week.

“Never before have so many voters voted before election day in British Columbia electoral history,” said the chief electoral officer, Anton Boegman.

Indeed, at least a quarter of eligible voters have requested mail-in ballots in some of B.C.'S most hotly contested ridings, including Vancouver-false Creek, Oak Bay- Gordon Head, Richmond- Steveston, Vancouver-langara, and North Vancouver-seymour.

So, this election started unusually with the snap call by NDP Leader John Horgan. It has proceeded unusually because of the pandemic. And, now, it is expected to end unusually.

CBC has a decision desk comprised of people who analyze the size, location and voting history of a riding and then use a mathematic­al equation to project winners, but “the mail-in ballot phenomenon ... adds another layer into that decision making,” Wood said.

While there will be some unpredicta­bility tonight, there will also be some candidates with large enough margins to declare victory regardless of the mail-in ballots, said CTV'S executive producer of elections, Anton Koschany.

And in other ridings, it may be possible to predict a winner based on the voting patterns of the evening, even if a large number of ballots remain outstandin­g.

For example, during the last municipal election, he and CTV statistici­ans made an early projection that Kennedy Stewart would be the next mayor — but then Stewart's lead narrowed, and some at CTV worried they'd made the call too early.

“But I just kept looking and saying, `The votes that are outstandin­g, yes, exceed the potential lead, but they're breaking evenly, the way that the votes through all of the polling places across the city have already broken.' And that's exactly what happened. The proportion continued right to the bitter end and the results stood,” Koschany said. “So that's the math. It sounds complicate­d, but it's actually not.”

The last time Koschany was not able to project an election's overall winner was in B.C. in 2017, when the results of the Courtenay-comox riding went to judicial recount and there was no declared premier for more than a month.

Once polls close at 8 p.m. tonight, B.C. elections officials will begin to count all the advance votes cast this week and those cast during the day at polling stations. But mailin votes, along with other absentee ballots, can't be counted for at least 13 days: during that time, Elections B.C., which has hired a much larger team, must manually sort these ballots and send them to their home ridings, and then must verify the proper person filled out the package as well as check that no one voted twice.

Officials warn this could take longer than 13 days, but if it remains on time, then the envelopes will be opened and the votes counted over a three-day period, from Nov. 6 to 8. But that could also be extended because of the sheer number of ballots and the extra safety measures staff must take to keep socially distant.

Then there is a six-day period in which candidates can ask for a judicial recount, which would be from Nov. 9-15, if the timing remains on track. The election would then officially end on Nov. 16, but it's unclear whether that is realistic any longer.

“It is our goal to try to achieve that,” Charles Porter, deputy chief electoral officer, said Friday. “But the requested vote by mail packages has far exceeded, I guess, our wildest dreams.”

By Monday, we should know how many mail-in ballots there were in total and by the end of next week, we should know that total in each riding. And when the mail-in ballots are being counted, officials promise to post results online daily, and said there could be staggered results — some winners could be declared early in this process, while others could take longer.

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 ?? CHAD HIPOLITO/ THE CANADIAN PRESS FILES ?? Green party supporters watch results come in at the Delta Ocean Pointe in Victoria on election night 2017. Pandemic-related measures affecting both how people vote and how they can gather in groups will mean a much different experience this year.
CHAD HIPOLITO/ THE CANADIAN PRESS FILES Green party supporters watch results come in at the Delta Ocean Pointe in Victoria on election night 2017. Pandemic-related measures affecting both how people vote and how they can gather in groups will mean a much different experience this year.

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