Ballot counting continues in San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara Counties for the Gubernatorial Recall Election on Tuesday.
San Luis Obispo Deputy County Clerk-Recorder Helen Nolan said they have received 110,000 ballots. This means the voter turnout is 59% as of Friday morning. Nolan said she expects that to increase to 60% - 65%.
At this time Nolan says they are verifying signatures, opening, and processing, and then they will go to counting.
Nolan said as of Friday, while there is a pretty wide margin in results, and that trend is expected to continue, there are still a lot of ballots to count.
"They are unofficial results so they should not be taken as the end because it is not the end, we still have 59,000 ballots to count in our possession," said Nolan.
It is probably going to be another week to two weeks of counting, according to Nolan.
At this point, they are not operating on weekends but that could change.
In Santa Barbara County, Clerk-Recorder Joe Holland said more than 146,000 ballots were cast, which turns out to be a 61.5% voter turnout.
Holland said for the 2003 recall election of Governor Gray Davis, turnout was 66%. Holland adds that the percentage was lower for this election due to higher overall registration.
As of Friday, Hollands says they have roughly 41,000 ballots left to count.
The election is required to be certified no later than October 14.
