BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) — Ahead of the 2024 election cycle, the Kern County Elections Division is working to boost voter confidence, as some residents remain deeply concerned about the voting and vote counting process.
Tuesday morning, the Kern Board of Supervisors discussed how an additional $2.7 million it approved for the Elections Division back in August has been budgeted so far. Election integrity was a clear priority.
“It’s my position that our election system that we have right now is flawed,” said Tom Pavich, Kern County Coordinator of the Election Integrity Project California.
Addressing such voter concerns is an all-hands-on deck effort by the Kern County Elections Division ahead of the March primary.
“Voter education and transparency is imperative to improving voter confidence,” said Aimee Espinoza, Kern County Auditor-Controller-County Clerk. “So, it just lets me know we still have some work to do, which I do know.”
In a presentation to the Board, Espinoza summarized how the additional budget had been utilized. Over $700,000 is budgeted for four more permanent staff positions, including an assistant registrar of voters and a public information officer.
Adam Clark, who joined earlier this month, is the department’s first PIO. Round one of interviews for the assistant registrar of voters role begins Wednesday.
A million dollars is for improving security, including security cameras at all county ballot drop box locations. Kern has 18 drop boxes, the newest just added to the CSU Bakersfield campus. Espinoza said a 19th may be coming to the Bakersfield College campus.
Residents made specific requests for camera placement.
“That the camera angles are such that if somebody’s walking in with 50 ballots and they’re putting 50 ballots in a drop box location, we wanna know that,” said Charles Shinn, a volunteer with Election Integrity Project California.
In response, Espinoza emphasized security cameras are not mandated by the state of California.
“We’re actually going above and beyond, because we’re purchasing cameras for this specific purpose of monitoring these drop boxes, or having eyes on the drop boxes, if you will,” she said, explaining she’s directly stated no camera should film voters’ faces directly. “As an elections official, it is my duty to toggle that line of having monitoring, however maintaining the voter anonymity and integrity in that aspect.”
Espinoza said to those concerned about voter fraud, the cameras hopefully “give them a piece of mind.” But a lingering concern is over signature verification.
“The enhancements that have been proposed, that’s all great, but let’s trust, but verify, that the election process has integrity,” Pavich said in an interview following the presentation. “It’s up to a person in the elections office to review those two signatures to see if they match, and we have had observers watch that process and question some of the signatures that have been approved.”
During the public comment session of the Board meeting, Pavich stated, “I have personally witnessed an employee, actually it was a [temporary employee] that was trained a total of seven minutes, and of that seven-minute period, the signature verification portion of the training was about one minute.”
Espinoza denied the allegation.
17 News previously did a deep dive into the signature verification process.
According to Espinoza, Kern’s election officials are trained by Larry Liebscher, a former investigator for Redding police department’s forensic crimes unit. Donna Johnston, President for the California Association of Clerks and Elections Officials, coordinates the training and explained employees are taught to look for specific elements of a signature that typically stay the same every time.
If a signature is rejected, the voter is sent a letter with a chance to sign again and submit a new signature for verification.
According to the Elections Division, in the 2022 primary, the signatures on 920 ballots could not be verified. Of those, 613 remain challenged, meaning a signature was not returned or the re-signed ballot again could not be approved.
In the general election, the signatures on 3,214 ballots could not be verified. Of those, 1,358 remain challenged.
“The elections department can make any claim, that’s great — but let’s have an independent third party come in and audit,” Pavich said, suggesting handwriting experts.
Pavich, who is calling for an auditing of the department, also claimed in 2022, 10,000 to 15,000 mail-in ballots were “undeliverable,” meaning the ballot did not reach the intended voter and was returned to the post office.
“I’ve not seen documentation on that, so, I’m not sure where he’s getting his numbers, or how he’s deriving those,” Espinoza said.
The Elections Division told 17 News 15,439 ballots were undeliverable in the 2022 primary and nearly 8,724 in the general election.
“As far as the elections process, there isn’t a formal audit where one comes in — auditors are checking everything,” Espinoza said. “However, throughout the election process, the elections office is in constant communication with the state of California. So that in a way is an audit, because they’re looking at the numbers we’re bringing in, the ballots we’ve receive, what we’re counting, still outstanding.”
Pavich also took issue with “messy” voter rolls, the list of all registered voters in Kern County, noting the rolls needed to be “cleaned up” to ensure election integrity, in case a dead individual or and individual no longer living in a certain location could cast a vote.
And the still-debated conversation over Kern’s continued use of the Dominion voting system was also brought up.
“You have to ask, how much oversight is there in that process?” Shinn said.
Espinoza clarified her department’s contract with Dominion was extended through 2025 — despite community backlash — because the allegations against the company were “unfounded.”
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