Section 17December 22, 1997, Sec./Art. 17

Counting procedure. - (a) The counting of votes shall be public and conducted in the designated counting center(s).

(b) The ballots shall be counted by the machine by precinct in the order of their arrival at the counting center. The election officer or his/her representative shall log the sequence of arrival of the ballot boxes and indicate their condition. Thereafter, the board shall, in the presence of the watchers and representatives of accredited citizens' arm, political parties/candidates, open the ballot box, retrieve the ballots and minutes of voting. It shall verify whether the number of ballots tallies with the data in the minutes.

If there are excess ballots, the poll clerk, without looking at the ballots, shall publicly draw out at random ballots equal to the excess and without looking at the contents thereof, place them in an envelope which shall be marked "excess ballots". The envelope shall be sealed and signed by the members of the board and placed in the compartment for spoiled ballots.

(c) The election officer or any authorized official or any member of the board shall feed the valid ballots into the machine without interruption until all the ballots for the precincts are counted.

(d) The board shall remain at the counting center until all the official ballots for the precinct are counted and all reports are properly accomplished.

For the purpose of the May 11, 1998 elections, the ballots shall be counted by precinct by the special members of the board in the manner provided in paragraph (b) hereof.