Section 54.07 - Counting Procedures for Punch-Card Ballots(1)Application. 950 CMR 54.07 applies wherever punch-card ballots are used. As used in 950 CMR 54.07 "computer" means any device for counting or tabulating punch-card ballots.(2)Establishment of Tabulation Center. The city or town clerk must designate a central tabulation center, or must designate all the polling places as tabulation centers, not later than one week before the date of the election. The center must have a barrier of some sort to enclose the counting area so that no unauthorized persons may touch any election materials or be in the counting area at any time.(3)Personnel. The center shall be staffed by a warden, a clerk, and as many inspectors as the city or town clerk determines to be necessary. The warden is the presiding officer at the tabulation center, but the city or town clerk is the presiding officer at a central tabulation center. The presiding officer shall assign election officers any duties that will assure compliance with this chapter. The warden and clerk must be from different political parties and the inspectors equally divided among the two leading political parties. All tabulation center personnel must be adequately trained in advance in the use of equipment which they will operate.(4)Observers. The chairman of each city or town political committee may appoint in writing a computer expert to observe the proceedings at the tabulation center. The general public must be allowed to observe all proceedings at the tabulation center, but election officers may establish a guard rail or similar device to separate observers from the election officers, ballots, and counting equipment. If there are so many observers that they obstruct the proceedings, election officers may take appropriate steps to ensure cooperation in observing and collecting information.(5)Transportation to Central Tabulation Center. (a) If a central tabulation center is within the city or town, the container shall immediately be transported to the tabulation center accompanied by the precinct warden, the precinct clerk, and a police officer, who shall exercise constant control and supervision over the locked metal carrying case.(b) If a central tabulation center is outside the city or town, the locked metal carrying case shall instead first be similarly transported to the office of the city or town clerk and all metal carrying case shall be transported together to the tabulation center in vehicles designated by the city or town clerk and owned by the city or town. Each presiding officer shall transfer possession of the key to his carrying case to the city or town clerk. The carrying cases shall be loaded in full public view and unloaded in the presence of the election officers at the tabulation center. The vehicle transporting the carrying cases outside the city or town shall be accompanied at all times by the city or town clerk or his designee, and the carrying cases shall not be opened at any time before they arrive at the tabulation center.(6)Tabulation by Computer.(a) At the tabulation center, each precinct shall be tabulated separately. An inspection team shall examine the punch-card ballots and remove those which cannot be tabulated by the computer and which were not already removed. The inspection team shall also riffle the cards to remove any loose or hanging chads.(b) The cards that are to be tabulated by computer shall be checked by the inspection team to make certain they are in proper condition to be counted.(c) In the case of a primary, the inspection team must make certain that there is one group of cards for each party, and they shall check the cards in each group to make sure all cards in the group are of the same poltical party.(d) If any ballot cards are rejected by the computer, they shall be counted manually.(e) After the computer completes the printout of the votes, the tabulation center warden and clerk shall sign the computer printout, but in primaries, sign each of the party computer printouts, and take the computer printout to the tally station.(f) Where the ballot cards are fed into a computer one-by-one by hand, the ballot cards shall be separated into convenient blocks, and one election officer shall feed the cards into the computer while the other watches the tape. A stacker tray must be used to receive ballots counted by the computer.(7)Counting by Hand.(a) The election officers shall place all rejected cards, whether removed by the inspection team or rejected by the computer, in a plainly marked envelope along with the damaged cards and the write-in over-voted cards and envelopes, separated previously. At primaries, these rejected, damaged and write-in over-voted cards should be put in separate envelopes for each party.(b) The envelope shall then be taken to a tally station which is staffed by election officers equally representing the two leading political parties. The officers must manually count any rejected, damaged, and write-in over-voted cards, except for the over-voted office, that have not been counted at the polling place, and record the results on a block tally sheet headed "Rejected Cards". At a primary, each party must be counted separately.(c) When the rejected, damaged and write-in over-voted card count is completed and the votes totaled, the totals from the tally sheets shall be entered on the precinct total tally sheet. (d) The rejected, damaged and write-in over-voted cards shall then be put into an envelope, appropriately marked, and placed in a metal carrying case for delivery to the city or town clerk. At a primary, separate envelopes must be used for each party.(8)Tallying and Announcing Result. (a) The sheet showing the result, as printed by the computer, shall be fastened to the precinct total tally sheet for transmission to the city or town clerk. Each precinct total tally sheet shall show:1. the total number of names checked on the voting lists,2. the total number of ballots cast,3. the names of all persons voted for,4. the number of votes for each person and the title of the office for which he was a candidate,5. the number of blank ballots for each office, and, including an allocation of blanks corresponding to any punch cards improperly not cast by voters,6. the number of yes and no votes in answer to any question to voters. The electronic machine record, the totals of write-in votes, and the totals of rejected, damaged, and write-in over-voted ballots shall then be signed by the warden and clerk. The presiding officer at the tabulation center, or whatever election officer he designates, shall then publicly and in the presence of the other election officers distinctly announce the number of votes cast for each candidate for each office and the number of yes and no votes cast on any question. At a central tabulation center, this announcement shall be made for each precinct as soon as the precinct record has been completed.
(b) The warden and clerk shall then sign the precinct total tally sheet, any block or total tally sheet, and the computer printout. They shall then place these items in a separate marked envelope which is then signed by the warden. (8A)Reporting Results to Central Reporting Service. The clerk may report by telephone the results of final precinct tallies for any presidential preference primary, state primary or general election to a central media reporting service in consideration for a contribution, in an amount approved by the state secretary, to the respective state-wide municipal clerks association to be used for continuing education programs for municipal clerks.(9)Sealing and Transmitting Materials.(a) All official election materials, except tally sheets and voting list envelopes and keys, shall be placed into the precinct's metal container as a part of the election record. The warden shall then lock the metal carrying case.(b) The warden shall give the metal carrying case, an envelope containing the tally sheets, an envelope containing the voting lists used at the election, and the keys to the city or town clerk.