by Breeanna Jent on 2014-12-04
Corey Jackson last week requested a recount of votes for the city council seat he lost by seven votes.
Just before the Thanksgiving holiday on Wednesday, Nov. 26 - the last day a recount could be requested - Jackson requested a recount for the Moreno Valley City Council District 2 seat he lost to Planning Commissioner Jeffrey Giba after the Riverside County Registrar of Voters announced its final certified results the Friday prior, Nov. 21.
"I got a number of requests by people in the second district" for the recount, Jackson told the Moreno Valley City News. "We want to make sure that every vote was counted properly and trust in the results."
The race was close between the two candidates: Giba had 1,269 votes to Jackson's 1,262 votes. Early voting results showed Jackson in the lead, and the two were even tied at one point as they ran for the seat against seven additional opponents. There were about 5,879 votes cast in the District 2 race, according to the Registrar of Voters.
The seven votes came within a tenth of a percentage point - within the margin of error, according to Jackson.
"There were about 60 ballots that were thrown out for various reasons," Jackson said Monday. "That might be the opportunity to make sure some of those votes were valid. Originally they were counted by a machine, and there is room for error in the machine."
Jackson requested a manual recount, which began 9 a.m. Wednesday, Dec. 3. Manual recounts are scheduled to take three to four days, according to Rebecca Spencer, Registrar of Voters.
The Registrar of Voters website states that the cost of a recount is paid for by the requestor, and Jackson was taking community donations to cover the cost of the recount, which came out to about $6,000. The cost of a recount varies depending on if a manual or automated recount is requested, Spencer explained. Automated recounts require less people to count the ballots and also save about a day, Spencer shared.
Jackson said, "I made it clear that I couldn't afford to do this myself, so it's going to have to be a community effort."
As of Monday, Dec. 1 at 12:30 p.m., Jackson had raised $2,540 of his $7,000 goal.
State law allows any voter to request a recount up to five days after election results are officially certified.
Giba, who won the seat, told the Moreno Valley City News Monday that Jackson has a right to request a recount, but stood by what he told the Moreno Valley City News on Nov. 21: "I keep telling people what I've said from the beginning. It's in the Lord's hands, not in mine. It's that simple, nothing complicated."
Moreno Valley's swearing in ceremony is set for Dec. 9.