1-2-3-4 Franklin County Recount Bluues…

It’s all over but the crying in Franklin County this afternoon. We finished the recount by 3:00 PM, allaying fears among the volunteers that our sentence to the courthouse would be indefinite.

All in all, it was a pleasant experience with the atmosphere of community-driven democracy that some St. Albans City residents must surely miss from the old days before Town Meeting was replaced with conventional balloting.  The participants were so convivial in fact, that there were frequent requests to keep the noise down so that we could hear our partners read the ballots.   Most of the volunteers were from the blue-haired battallion (sixty and older), including surprisingly heavy representation by men.  Almost no one had prior experience with a recount and so, at the outset, confusion was the order of the day. After a few false starts, the teams of hand-counters each found their own rhythm and made short work of the job. A technical issue sidelined one of the machine readers but a replacement was soon brought in from Swanton.  If it weren’t for that minor glitch the machine count would no doubt have been finished even before the hand-count.

At lunchtime we were released to dine on pizza, check our phones and walk our dogs.  After a generous lunch break the count resumed.  At the end of the short day, many sat for a moment in dazed disbelief when we were told we were all through and could simply go home.

Once the word gets out, I think they’ll find it a lot easier to recruit volunteers in Franklin County the next time there’s a recount! ” ‘Piece a cake!” they’ll say.

About Sue Prent

Artist/Writer/Activist living in St. Albans, Vermont with my husband since 1983. I was born in Chicago; moved to Montreal in 1969; lived there and in Berlin, W. Germany until we finally settled in St. Albans.

16 thoughts on “1-2-3-4 Franklin County Recount Bluues…

  1. Twenty-five eager participants counted 5,078 votes in 7 hours including a one hour lunch break. No difference in results detected, and the unity vibe was alive and kicking.

  2. say the same for the Chittenden recount. Despite plenty of volunteers, it was badly organized and many volunteers spent tons of time sitting around doing nothing. When I left at 2:30, I don’t think they had even finished 2 districts out of 17.

  3. Grand Isle finished up around 1:00 PM.  Only glitch was one town that tightly rolled all their ballots – stacking curled ballots into neat piles is akin to herding cats.

    Only minor differences from the first count – I think Deb gained one vote net.

  4. …will probably be done tomorrow afternoon.  We did most of the work today and the remaining counters (I had a prior commitment for Thursday) should be able to easily finish up tomorrow.

  5. Finished up about 4:30.  Congenial group and clerk made it a rather fun experience.  Several of us were experienced counters.  I had been told that as many as 54 counters might show up.  In fact only 24 hardy souls showed up and that was exactly as many as the courthouse could accomodate.  

  6. We had 24 people (including observers), and handily dispatched all the ballots in one day, despite issues with the ballot counting machine (out of commission for over 2 hrs) that was used for certain towns.

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