Reply #1: CA: California still counting heavy Feb. 5 vote

[EFerrari]

California still counting heavy Feb. 5 vote
By Jesse Mckinley
Published: February 17, 2008


SAN FRANCISCO: It has been nearly two weeks since primary day in California, and Stephen Weir is still ironing ballots.

Like many of his counterparts across the state, Weir, the registrar in Contra Costa County, east of San Francisco, is still counting votes from the Feb. 5 election; and, because of the weight and fold of some of the absentee ballots, Weir says he and his staff often have to steam them to allow them to be fed into vote-counting machines.

"Last election, the clerk ironed about 13,000 ballots," Weir said. "There's a setting just below 'cotton' and just above 'wool' that works pretty well. 'Silk' is also a really good setting."

Election officials say a combination of high turnout, technology flaws and millions of mailed-in and dropped-off ballots have led to painstakingly slow returns in some counties, with nearly 800,000 ballots remaining to be processed.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/02/17/america/17vote.php