“Even We Cannot Perform Miracles”: Shasta County Elections Clerk Warns Supervisors Of Election Deadlines

Late on March 27, less than twenty-four hours before supervisors will vote again on Shasta County’s election process, Shasta County’s Clerk and Registrar of Elections, Cathy Darling Allen has released a 26-page preliminary report on the logistics that would be needed to accomplish a full hand count of Shasta County’s votes. 

The report indicates that the cost of a full manual tally in Shasta County would reach at least $1.6 million, including labor costs for the 1,300 staff that would be required to accomplish it. Those costs are in addition to the cost of an electronic voting machine system, which would still be required by state and federal law.

The wording of the report’s executive summary clearly documents the extremely challenging timeline that Darling Allen has faced as she has attempted to continue to fulfill her mandate as an elections official after supervisors’ votes over the last several months to cancel the County’s contract with Dominion and consider a plan to hand count the County’s votes instead.

“I write to you today as the chief election official of the County of Shasta,” Darling Allen wrote in a letter to supervisors that accompanied the report. 

“Having served in this role since 2004 and having been duly elected five times by the voters of this county, it is right and fitting that I inform you, in writing, of the potential consequences of the recent actions taken by the Board.”

Darling Allen used the letter to strongly recommend that supervisors enter into a contract for a California-certified electronic voting system no later than today, March 28, to ensure that a voting system is in place in time for two potential upcoming special elections, one for a proposed Shasta Fire District formation which would occur, if needed in late August and the other to fill a Gateway Unified School District Board vacancy, which would occur, if needed, in early November. 

“Please carefully consider your decisions and understand that while my office is full of extremely competent and prepared professionals, even we cannot perform miracles. We need the resources and time required to carefully develop procedures to ensure no Shasta County voter is disenfranchised. If the county misses the deadlines contained within this letter the blame for election failure will rest surely at each of your feet.”

Choosing an electronic voting system is not optional, as indicated by Susan Lapsley, California’s Deputy Secretary of State at recent County meetings, Darling Allen wrote. Federal and state laws require that all voters be able to cast a ballot privately and independently which requires at least the partial use of an electronic voting machine system. 

Darling Allen advised supervisors to either take no action on hand counting votes or vote for a staff-approved plan to allow for limited hand counting of one or two races in upcoming Shasta County elections. 

A full manual tally of votes is something no other California county has ever attempted, Darling Allen emphasizes in her letter, noting that California’s Secretary of State is considering legislating against the process altogether. 

The development and implementation of such an entirely new, untested, unproven program would be extremely difficult, she says, requiring the County “to develop policies and processes from the ground up to allow for all the complexities of ballot processing and tally.”

“This includes but is not limited to developing processes for ballot examination and duplication, the tally itself, recording and aggregating election results by hand, allowing for meaningful observation, transportation, onboarding the hundreds of required temporary staff, adjudication of ballots and auditing the manual tally for accuracy.”

As she reminded supervisors, under California election code, Darling Allen as the elected Registrar of Voters is the public official charged with conducting the local election process from the “framing of ballots through the final tally and canvass of election results.”

“I take my statutory responsibility seriously. Creating a new voting system from scratch that likely will not comply with state law, undermines my ability to perform those statutory responsibilities, intruding on my position as a duly elected Shasta County official,” she wrote.

“It is imperative,” Darling Allen continued, “that the voters of Shasta County continue to enjoy the right of franchise, and that elections in Shasta County continue to be performed with transparency, accuracy, efficiency and with a servant’s heart. That is the job I was elected to do, and I intend to continue doing it.” 

Read Darling Allen’s full letter to supervisors here.

Read the Elections Office Report: Elections Analysis of Manual Tally Options here.

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