All Wisconsin has been debating and pondering the reporting of votes from the Town of Brookfield in the supreme court race. Waukesha County’s become a national topic, in the worst way.
One way to prevent something like this is to allow citizens to see – on election night – how each precinct within a county voted, not just for local races, but how the precincts went in statewide or national races.
Of Jefferson, Walworth, and Rock counties, only Jefferson and Rock counties’ election websites list how each precinct went in the statewide race.
It’s one of the reasons, while watching returns come in on each website, I wrote that “Of Walworth, Jefferson, Rock counties, Walworth has least attractive & informative election website, Jefferson easily has best.”
My point is not that there was fraud or error in any of these counties, but rather that the best way to avoid even the suspicion of fraud is to post detailed election results, including precinct-by-precinct returns for state and national races.
When one looks at the three counties’ websites, the differences are apparent —
Jefferson County
On the Jefferson County site, one can click a button, and see how each precinct voted for a candidate, including candidates for statewide office. On election night, one precinct didn’t report (the Town of Lake Mills) and residents would have know that both because the precinct’s row was blank, and also because the county posted a notice about the delay. That’s the best practice: one can see which precincts are not in, and the county also put up a notice stating as much.
Anyone wondering about how a precinct voted could see, for each one, how many voters selected each candidate.
Rock County
On the Rock County website, there’s a link to a detailed .pdf that shows how each precinct voted. Here’s a sample:
The Jefferson County approach is better, I think, but Rock County provides the same information in a less user-friendly format.
Walworth County
Easily the least transparent and informative of the three county election websites. Here’s how Walworth County displays the Supreme Court vote in the county:
No precinct-by-precinct information, and so no way to see how many votes went for one candidate, in any given town.
Nearby counties display this information, and Walworth should follow their example (preferably that of the detailed, highly transparent Jefferson County website).