If you think your vote doesn't count, the race Cleveland City Council in the newly redrawn Ward 12 on the city's west side shows how much it really does. After all votes were tallied Tuesday, only seven votes separated incumbent Danny Kelly, who had 1,456, from challenger Tanmay Shah's 1,463.
That won't be the final tally as vote-by-mail ballots, provided they were postmarked by Monday, have four days after the election to be returned and counted. As of 9:30 p.m. Tuesday, the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections showed there were 56 yet to be returned in Ward 12.
Also, each Election Day, there are provisional ballots or ballots cast by voters whose eligibility is in question, very often related to their address. The provisional ballot they cast is set aside until election officials are able to verify eligibility, and then the vote is counted. Numbers released late Wednesday by the Board of Elections show there were 29 provisional ballots cast in Ward 12.
Under Ohio law, those updated results do not come until the election is certified, which occurs no later than 21 days after the election. If that margin of victory is less than a half percent — currently, .24% in this case —a recount is ordered within ten days.
This actually happened last year in a race for Cuyahoga County Council in District 6 when Democratic challenger Robert Schleper was leading incumbent Jack Schron by just 17 votes out of more than 60,000 votes cast. After late returning vote by mail ballots and provisional ballots were added in Schleper's margin of victory actually grew to 245 votes.
