Luzerne County Courthouse
                                 File photo

Luzerne County Courthouse

File photo

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Unofficial general election results from six of Luzerne County’s 186 precincts were still not available shortly after 10 p.m. Wednesday.

“We are in the process of finalizing the results, and they will be publicly released as soon as they are available,” Acting County Manager Romilda Crocamo said at that time.

The delay impacted one precinct in Hazle Township and five precincts in Swoyersville, Plymouth Township and Bear Creek Township.

Results in the latter three municipalities had been sequestered due to previously reported mail ballot errors that had been corrected on the electronic ballot marking devices at polling places, she had said. The Hazle Township results were not included in the election night posting because they were delivered to the election bureau late, she said.

Crocamo said the administration was working to post all six precincts in one batch.

Mail ballots

In other election-related matters, Crocamo said representatives from nursing homes had twice attempted to drop off multiple general election mail ballots for their facility residents at the county election bureau, but the county stopped them in both cases because they did not have state-mandated forms from each voter authorizing a representative to deliver the ballots on their behalf.

County Councilman Walter Griffith sent county officials an email Wednesday from a citizen reporting that she witnessed one of these attempted drop-offs, and Crocamo disclosed the second attempt later in the day.

Crocamo said the attempts have convinced her the county must reach out to all nursing homes and assisted living facilities to ensure they are informed of the state ban on dropping off someone else’s mail ballot without an official authorization form.

Griffith said the attempts, though unsuccessful, warrant a review of all video footage of ballot drop boxes to determine if anyone delivered multiple general election ballots without detection.

“Somebody certainly should look at them,” Griffith said.

Crocamo told county officials she will be reaching out to representatives at all three outside drop box locations in Pittston, Hazleton and Wright Township instructing them to preserve video and inform the county sheriff’s department to do the same with drop box footage from the county’s Penn Place Building in Wilkes-Barre.

Outside locations hosting boxes had agreed to retain video surveillance recordings for 60 days after the election and provide them to the county upon request.

A sticker on the front of the boxes warned voters they are only permitted to deposit their own ballot and that they are under video surveillance.

Crocamo said she will meet with the solicitor’s office to determine the next course of action.

County Election Board Chairwoman Denise Williams told Griffith around 9 p.m. Wednesday that the day’s communications were the first she became aware of any attempt and that she has reached out to the county District Attorney’s Office on the matter.

County District Attorney Sam Sanguedolce said he will investigate specific reports of alleged criminal activity from the county administration but added he does not have the staffing resources to assign someone to watch the many hours of video footage from multiple locations spanning multiple days solely to see if there were any other possible batch drop-offs.

It would be up to the election bureau or another county entity to watch the entire collection of footage if county officials deem that action feasible, Sanguedolce said.

Reach Jennifer Learn-Andes at 570-991-6388 or on Twitter @TLJenLearnAndes.