El Centro, California - Yesterday, the Imperial County Registrar of Voters submitted a report to California’s Secretary of State, which provided the estimated number of unprocessed ballots.  In Imperial County, there are currently just over 6,900 unprocessed ballots comprised of vote-by-mail, provisional, conditional voter registration and others that require further individual review.

Of the unprocessed ballots, there are 5,924 vote-by-mail ballots.  These ballots include those that were hand delivered a few days prior to Election Day in addition to the day of the election, ballots received via mail by Friday, June 8, 2018 (postmarked by Tuesday, June 5, 2018), and ballots that were forwarded by other counties.  Furthermore, the unprocessed ballots include 975 provisional ballots, 14 conditional voter registration ballots and 9 that require further review due to damage.

Processing vote-by-mail ballots is an elaborate process and is part of the official canvass of the vote, which requires several steps before the voter’s ballot is tabulated.  The canvass process is utilizing up to 30-trained individuals to process the ballots.  The vote tallying process includes:

• securely removing the ballots from transport bags;
• logging the ballots;
• removing the secrecy tabs that reveal the voter’s signature;
• scanning the envelope to retrieve the voter’s information in order to verify the voter’s signature;
• opening the verified ballot envelopes;
• separating the ballot from the envelope;
• separating the ballot into a scanning category (vote-by-mail and voters whom request a ballot);
• separating the ballot cards by batches to then get counted and logged; and then
• tallying the ballots.

The unofficial results that are currently posted on the Registrar’s website at www.co.imperial.ca.us/regvoters are the tallied results of the semifinal official canvass of the vote, which includes polling place voters and vote-by-mail ballots that were received up to a few days prior to Election Day.  The Registrar of Voters office will post another update this evening with the tally of ballots that have been processed since Election Day.  Additionally, the Registrar’s staff will work diligently throughout the weekend and expect to have tallied all of the currently unprocessed ballots by Tuesday, June 12, 2018.

The Registrar of Voters’ wishes to thank the public for their patience as the staff is following the required steps and taking all measures to provide a secure, transparent, and accurate count in a timely manner.

For more information, contact the Registrar of Voters’ office at (442) 265-1060.