ojai news at The Ojai Post :: blog, newspaper, events in Ojai, California

I just called the County Registrar's Office and talked with Virgina Bloom, the person in charge of accounting for all votes countywide. She told me that there are 30,000 absentee and provisional votes still to count. These votes are county wide and there's no way to tell how many of them are from within the city limits of Ojai. The county has thirty days to certify the election.

According to their statistical projections, the 99.96 % of total votes in the Ojai city council race means that the race for the third city council seat between Lenny Klaif and Joe De Vito is outside the margin of remaining votes. This means that they've counted a lot of the absentee and provisionals from Ojai already. If that holds true, it means that Lenny has won. However, the county will be updating these numbers periodically until they certify the race. Stay tuned. The link Tyler posted will show you the updates, you'll just have to scroll down to the Ojai City Council race.

I'm not a mathematician and don't assume anything about percentages, but...

If 96.96% has been counted, doesn't that leave a .04% left to count?

If Lenny has 17.28% and Joe has 17.16%, doesn't that mean greater than a .04% spread?

With these assumptions, it does look pretty good for Lenny. Any math folks out there who could clarify?

I know that in some races, an automatic recount is triggered when the margin is, for instance, 1/4 of 1% or 1/2 of 1%. Anyone know if that's the case in our City Council election?

I'll check on the exact rules for recount, but I think it's highly unlikely that there will need to be one. Local elections are always inherently close.

If the County Registrar is now reporting 100% of votes counted, isn't that it? If so: Congratulations Steve, Carol and Lenny. Good job. Special recognition also to Dennis Leary and Pete Lafollette, who got significant percentages of the vote without either having any formal campaign, any campaign signs, any campaign committee, newspaper or party endorsements or any of the other trappings of a usual run.

Very exciting. Let the change begin!!

The latest information I have from City Clerk Carlon Strobel, as of 3:00 p.m. this afternoon, is that I am still up 6 votes on Joe DeVito in the race for third place. There are an unknown number of absentee ballots that were dropped off at polling places yesterday that have not been tablulated. It is not known when these ballots will be counted.

So we wait, and hope for the best.

Thanks to everyone who voted, particularly those who voted for me. Thanks too to those who live outside the City but who urged their friends within the City to vote for me.

Special thanks to my treasurers, Kenley Neufeld and Leslie Davis, to Todd Miller who designed my poster, and to Pete and Dennis who braved a lot of ugliness and kept on pushing without the financial resources of the other candidates.

We shall see.

Len Klaif

Congrats Len.
Whatever happens.....the truth is knocking on Mr. DeVito AND.....the
City of Widders.

If ol' Joe had shown up at the last candidate forum, perhaps he might have gained those 6 votes.....

Someone will need to check in with Carlon Strobel tomorrow to confirm, but this is what I now understand based on a conversation this evening with an elected city official:

1) The 5,000-odd votes is representative of up to 3 votes per voter, NOT 5,000 voters. There are only about 4,000 registered voters in Ojai, which means a max of 12,000 votes.

2) There were approximately 1,000 uncounted ELECTION DAY absentee ballots handed in, which collectively would represent up to 3,000 votes uncounted.

3) The early results of 16.7% of votes counted was based on early absentee ballots and were counted first thing election morning.

4) The count could take over a month.

Basically, we have a LOT of votes still to count and a long way to go. We'll see what candidates closed the strongest leading up to election day. Stay tuned!

It's unlikely that the absentee ballots handed in equal 1000. I was working at one of the largest polling places here in Ojai and I saw about 10 absentee ballots turned in in the first 4 hrs. Usually the first shift is tied with the last shift as the busiest. Extrapolating this out in a most unscientific manner gets us between 30 and 50 outstanding absentee ballots. Additionally, there was only one provisional ballot turned in while I was working. That's maybe another 10-15 votes. That 1000 number sounds highly inaccurate to me. At best I'm guessing between 40-60 votes left out there that were turned in at the polling places.

The county turnout was about 37% so Ojai's total, it it tracks with the county, should be about 1625 total voters or 4884 votes for city council. We're already over that number making Ojai's turnout higher than the county overall. That's par for the course. Historically, the turnout here in Ojai for city council in the last 10 years has been between 39% and 46%. Perhaps counter-intuitively, off year elections have a higher turnout for city council than do Presidential elections. This is probably because the Presidential elections, especially the contentious ones like the last two, suck up all the oxygen in the room. This serves to put the lie to Carol's statement at the last forum that it was somehow significant that Sue Horgan and Rae Henstad ran unopposed in 2004. All this should mean that the turnout this year was in the neighborhood of 46% because there was a lot of press and campaigning going on. This number is probably moderated by the fact that everyone knew that the two big races, US Representative and Governor, were going to the Republican incumbents. Some people might have stayed home as a result.

At any rate, I'm predicting as high as 2,040 total voters in the Ojai city council race. We only have 1670 on the board right now. This means that in addition to the provisional and absentee ballots turned in at the polls on election day, there are an unknown number of absentee ballots in the mail as voters are able to mail them on election day itself. There could be as many as 370 uncounted votes out there. Not 1000.

I still have nothing to report on the rules for a recount in local races in California. I think it's highly unlikely that there would or should be one. Nonetheless, I have a call out the the legals at the Sec of State for California and I'm waiting for an answer. A cursory search for the answer on the internet and through California law came up with nil.

Thanks to everyone who supported Lennie, Pete, and myself. Together, we accounted for about a third of the votes. That's a powerful minority voice, sort of like a third party taking a third of the national vote. I hope and pray Lennie prevails, but even if he does not, politics in Ojai will not be the same. If Lennie does get in, we "small town character" advocates will have established a secure beachhead for the main advance. "We few," as Henry V called his soldiers at the battle of Agincourt, are facing overwhelming odds from forces that would destroy Ojai and the planet. It will take each one of us, small town characters that we are, to give our talents to the cause of peaceful survival. I will continue to do what I'm doing, and am proud to be associated with the Ojai characters I interact with on this site, and with those who choose to bear with me in the political arena. I tend to go over the top with poetic license, or go under with interminable rambling. Once in awhile, I hit that sweet spot, which Ojai evokes. It's called "character," as in "small town character," as opposed to "big city slicker." My post-election analysis is that a third of us, who had enough character to vote, voted for "small town character"; a third are not sure, and so voted for the familiar and the safe; and a third do not trust small town characters as much as they do big city values. Our job is to persuade that undecided middle third that it is in their interest to support smallness, town values as in "town hall meeting," and character for its health and feeling benefits. I think we did score a victory in this election for "small town" character values, whatever the results appear to be. With Henry V, I sing the Te Deum in my heart, and am proud to have fought on Ojai's own St. Crispin's Day.

I entered the city council race for reasons
somewhat a mystery- the job itself being a long and
thankless task with few willing participants. I know
now going through the elections process that the
community has found it’s voice, or one that I never
quite heard before here. I’ve seen the old guard of
Ojai awaken, and I’ve seen the newer one sing harmony
with not the same old song and dance, but a stirring
melody of hope and promise that is every bit as rare
and beautiful as this valley surrounded by mountains
that filter the light of dawn and dusk. That this
place is like no other, that is the essential message
and the only one that really matters. Yes it is
threatoned here, but no It is not too late to change
that- it is neither a lost horizon nor a lost cause.
I won’t be singing the melody from a city council
seat but will be humming it as I make the rounds on
bicycle and on foot to friends I see walking still
quiet streets, still healthy small neighborhoods with
trees and views and and still open places with pure
streams to see and visit. It is still good to live in
this place, to know and value it, to be a part of it.
To see and hear this song being sung brings feelings
of joy and contentment of what remains in this quiet
valley of peace.

Pete LaFollette

Well, here we go. They've just added 75 votes and now De Vito's won by 1 vote. They're still showing an incomplete percentage of votes counted:

http://recorder.countyofventura.org/Election%20Result.htm

BTW the 75 votes represents 25 ballots as you can vote for three. There should be more votes out there.

OVN this morning says there are an estimated 800-900 uncounted absentee ballots.

Might I suggest an arm-wrestling competition between Len and Joe if its a tie.

I'm sticking by my 340 number. The OVN has seldom been right.

New update as of 5:19pm on November 23.

Vote Count Percent
NP - STEVE OLSEN 1,476 25.64%
NP - CAROL B. SMITH 1,152 20.01%
NP - JOE DE VITO 1,024 17.79%
NP - LEONARD J. KLAIF 968 16.82%
NP - DENNIS LEARY 571 9.92%
NP - PETE LAFOLLETTE 544 9.45%
WRITE-IN 19 0.33%
Total 5,754 99.97%

Another update:

Last Updated: November 15, 2006 5:21 PM

NP - STEVE OLSEN 1,693 25.38%
NP - CAROL B. SMITH 1,328 19.91%
NP - JOE DE VITO 1,199 17.97%
NP - LEONARD J. KLAIF 1,119 16.77%
NP - DENNIS LEARY 673 10.09%
NP - PETE LAFOLLETTE 638 9.56%
WRITE-IN 19 0.28%
Total 6,669 99.97%

To Brad, (Post of 11.8.06) Smirking About Joe Not Showing Up At The Candidates Forum And Subsequently Losing Those Six Important Votes: Don't sweat it, Brad. I've pissed all over myself many times while, seemingly, aiming into the wind. It happens. Please don't let Joe's victory--you have seen the latest counts?--disturb your sense of political propriety. We can't have that happen.

OJAI CITY COUNCIL (VF-3)
6/6 100.00%
Vote Count Percent
NP - STEVE OLSEN 1,789 25.40%
NP - CAROL B. SMITH 1,404 19.93%
NP - JOE DE VITO 1,259 17.87%
NP - LEONARD J. KLAIF 1,183 16.79%
NP - DENNIS LEARY 713 10.12%
NP - PETE LAFOLLETTE 671 9.53%
WRITE-IN 23 0.33%
Total 7,042 99.97%