VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — Election Day may be over, but now it's a busy time for election officials as they go through and make sure the unofficial results are accurate, a process called the canvass.
"This is a process, and I will tell you that I think the public wants us to undertake this process. There's a reason we do this and I think it's very important for everyone to know that," said Jeffrey L. Marks, the chair of the Virginia Beach Electoral Board.
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On Thursday, election officials began the canvass at the Municipal Center. While state law gives them until Nov. 15 to certify the results to the State Board of Elections, they're hopeful to be done by mid-next week.
The bipartisan electoral board oversees the process, but Marks stresses that politics are kept out of it.
"We are not beholden to any party or any candidate. We're beholden to the city of Virginia Beach, and frankly, the 335,000 registered voters here," said Marks.
The process includes going through results reported from voting machines and making sure they appear to add up correctly.
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In other years, this process has gotten a lot of scrutiny over the possibility of recounts, which can happen in Virginia if a losing candidate is within a percentage of the leader.
This year, it does not appear that any races are heading for recounts in the city.
Observers from the political parties are allowed to watch it all play out.
"What you try to make sure is that if something does happen, it's isolated. It's not systematic. It's resolved and if something does happen, we'll find it," said Marks.
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They're also still going through provisional ballots, including people who used Same Day Registration.
Marks says that effort does take a lot of resources, as election officials have to verify someone was eligible to vote. He says it'd be easier if people just registered to vote through the normal process before the deadline.
This year, there are about 5,000 provisional ballots, he said.
"There's a lot of research that goes into this behind the scenes that has to be put into each and every provisional ballot, so you can understand we get frustrated with the number of provisional ballots," said Marks.
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He wants to assure people the results are being counted accurately and fairly.
"Obviously, there's some secrets we can't divulge when it comes to security and things of that nature, but the more I can get out and explain to people and maybe they will try to understand," he said.
