Mayoral Limbo: Questions Linger While Election Officials Slowly Count Votes

Despite Annapolis election officials setting aside an entire day to count the remaining votes, an answer may not come Thursday on who will be the city's next mayor.

After recovering votes from an inoperable voting machine in Ward 7 and corrected results from a Ward 1 precinct early Thursday morning, mayoral challenger Mike Pantelides led incumbent Josh Cohen by 82 votes—3,781 to 3,699.

But while trying to count and certify the remaining votes—provisional and absentee ballots—little progress could be made without an objection from one of two sides of the issue.

The three members of the city's Board of Canvassers, Chairman Michael Parmele, Pamela Johnson and Peter Wirig, arrived at 9 a.m. Thursday to complete the count. But throughout the day, the work of the election officials has been stifled between the arguments of Pantelides' attorney Tim Murnane, City Clerk Regina Watkins, and the technical support director for the voting machine software over how to proceed.

One major issue was how the different ballots were being organized, and ultimately how they will be counted. Because of the increased scrutiny brought by the attorneys, it wasn't as simple as creating piles for accepted and rejected ballots. Two other piles—accepted but challenged, and rejected but challenged—were also created.

Each ballot has to be thoroughly inspected to be sure it was filled out correctly, and envelopes postmarked by the final day they were accepted, Nov. 5.