11 Richmond voters given incorrect ballots at Gilpin Court polling place

Eleven Richmond voters were given the wrong ballot early Tuesday morning at a polling place that serves the Gilpin Court neighborhood, an error that left several people highly upset after they were told there was no way for them to cast a new ballot.

The affected voters at Precinct 310 were given ballots that only contained federal races, not local elections for mayor, city council and school board. 

All polling places have some of those ballots for use by military and overseas voters, but election workers apparently began handing them out to all voters when the polling place first opened around 6 a.m.

The issue was corrected early in the morning, but two voters who cast the incorrect ballots said they were told there was no way for them to vote in the local contests because they couldn’t be issued a new ballot.

“I’m really pissed about it,” said Andrea Cornelius, who said supporting local candidates was important to her and she feels she was denied the right to vote for them.

Officials eventually removed the chief election officer responsible for overseeing the polling place.

Richmond Electoral Board Chairwoman Starlet Stevens, who went to the precinct after the problem arose, said she wasn’t aware of any previous cases of voters being given the wrong ballot.

“They went and voted it, put it in the machine and then they realized, ‘Wait a minute, I didn’t see anything for the mayor’s race or the city council or the school board,” Stevens said.

If the voters had spotted the issue before feeding the ballot into the scanner, she said, they could have spoiled the ballot and been given the correct one.

Another affected voter who declined to give her name said she spoke up about the problem but was assured by a poll worker that she had the right ballot.

“She kept saying no, these are the correct ballots, she knew what she was doing,” the voter said.

Though the problem was fixed before it could impact more voters, several people in the small crowd that gathered outside the polling place said they were frustrated by what felt to them like a hostile or uncaring response from election officials.

School Board candidate Charlene Riley faulted Registrar Keith Balmer, saying his job is “hanging by the thinnest thread in my grandmama’s sewing kit.”

When Mayor Levar Stoney was asked about the issue Tuesday morning as he cast his ballot in Church Hill, he said the affected voters “should be pissed off” even though human error can and does occur in the democratic process.

“I’m pissed off as well,” he said. “At the end of the day, we’ve got to do better.”