Local election offi cials in Flor-
ida’s 67 county offi ces handled
the counting across the state. Some
election workers opened the envelopes
of ballots that had been approved to be
counted and fl attened the paper inside
to prepare it for the scanner, which tab-
ulated the votes. Ballots could be reject-
ed by the scanner because, for exam-
ple, the ink bled or multiple bubbles
were fi lled in for a single race. A three-
member canvassing board assessed
each of those ballots and decided
whether it could determine the voter’s
intent. The board in Broward County,
for example, met for weeks, reviewing
20 to 50 ballots a day that the scanner
could not read and rejecting none.
The board also set aside 322 enve-
lopes with signature problems thatvoters could fi x. If a signature was
missing or didn’t appear to match the
one on fi le with the state, Florida law
required election offi cials to give voters
notice so they could correct the error.
This is called ‘‘curing’’ a ballot. (Nearly
30 states, however, don’t have laws that
provide for a second chance.) Along
with signatures, there were other details
to get right on mail-in ballots and no60