Just in case the May 9th provincial election wasn’t already close enough, Elections BC has confirmed district electoral officer recounts in both the Courtenay-Comox and Vancouver-False Creek ridings.
Candidates can request a recount within three days of General Voting Day under two conditions: 1) if the difference between the top two candidates is within 100 ballots or 2) ballots were not correctly accepted or rejected, or there is an inconsistency among the number of votes for a candidate.
District electoral officer recounts in Courtenay-Comox and Vancouver-False Creek https://t.co/Oj7dUzNVF4
— Elections BC (@ElectionsBC) May 13, 2017
Courtenay-Comox Liberal candidate Jim Benninger’s request was accepted because he lost to Ronna-Rae Leonard of the NDP by just nine votes.
Phillip James Ryan of Vancouver-False Creek’s race wasn’t nearly as close. The Canadian Federalist Party candidate was last in the riding with just 75 votes, however, Elections BC accepted his request after a discrepancy report. An advanced voting ballot account recorded 403 votes for one candidate but a tally sheet and envelope actually containing the ballots only listed 399. Elections BC didn’t indicate which candidate this affected. Liberal candidate Sam Sullivan won the riding by 560 votes over NDP candidate Morgane Oger.
There were six recount requests in total. Elections BC confirms the other four request did not meet these two requirements.