In final count, local recounts cost taxpayers $37,000 in OT
The recounts in the presidential and senatorial races didn't affect the results but they did have a mild effect on taxpayers -- costing $37,000 in overtime pay -- officials said.
Philadelphia and Chester County were the only counties in the region to agree to recounts in Green Party presidential nominee Jill Stein's bid to overturn the result in the Pennsylvania tally that gave President-elect Donald Trump a narrow victory.
Recounts also were requested in the closely contested U.S. Senate race won by GOP incumbent Pat Toomey over Democrat Katie McGinty.
The overtime bills for the recounts in the two races were $32,000 for Chester County, and $5,000 for Philadelphia, officials said Thursday.
Voters petitioned their precincts as part of an organized effort by Stein's campaign lawyers and supporters. Stein had asked for a statewide recount and a forensic examination of voting machines to determine whether there were irregularities with electronic machines. A federal judge denied her request, saying it had come too late.
Chester County's figure includes overtime for county employees, including sheriff's deputies for security; payments to workers from a temp agency and food costs from Dec. 9 through Dec. 11. Workers counted by hand more than 190,000 paper ballots cast in 143 of the county's 228 precincts.
About 15 workers in Philadelphia earned overtime for reviewing voting machines and hand counting absentee and provisional ballots from Dec. 2 through Dec. 4 in 75 of the city's 1,686 voting divisions.
"It's not a huge amount of money," said David Thornburgh, president and chief executive officer of the Committee of Seventy government watchdog group. "Given that the recount served no particular purpose, except ego or something, even $37,000 is a waste of money."
Allegations of fraud were unfounded, Thornburgh said.
Lawrence Otter, attorney for Stein's campaign in Pennsylvania, acknowledged the campaign's request for a recount should have come sooner, but said the security of the states's electronic voting machines is "still an open question."
"Despite what some people say, there are still a couple points in which there are vulnerabilities of those machines," Otter said.
He added, "All over the state, people marched into the board of elections and asked for a recount of their precinct. Hopefully we've engaged more people to be more involved in the government process and the election process. If we've inspired people to do that, it was worth while."