Two votes currently separate Amanda Lord and Nancy Nelis Bostock in the race for Pinellas County School Board District 6, triggering a recount that could still be affected by outstanding and provisional ballots.
The Pinellas County Canvassing Board will meet at 5 p.m. today to review those ballots, meaning the margin between Lord and Bostock could change before a machine recount begins Friday morning.
Florida law requires a machine recount when the margin between candidates is 0.5% or less. If the margin remains at 0.25% or less following the machine recount, a manual recount is required.
The District 6 race is for the seat currently held by Stephanie Meyer, who did not seek reelection this year. Unlike the county’s at-large school board seats, District 6 is a single-member district, meaning only voters living within its boundaries vote in the contest.
Lord and Bostock were the only candidates to qualify for the seat. Bostock previously spent 10 years on the Pinellas County School Board and four years on the Pinellas County Commission. Lord has worked as a senior project manager at Franklin Templeton Investments, taught as an adjunct professor at St. Petersburg College and served in PTA leadership.
The election is not settled yet. “We also have a number of outstanding ballots and provisional ballots that have not been counted, and it may shift the contest,” Ashley Knight-Taylor, communications director for the Pinellas County Supervisor of Elections, told the Catalyst.
The Canvassing Board meeting will include Supervisor of Elections Julie Marcus and Judge Edwin Jagger. After the meeting, the Supervisor of Elections website will be updated to reflect any changes resulting from the additional ballots.
Whatever the margin is at that point, election officials will begin with a machine recount at 9 a.m. Friday at the Election Service Center, 13001 Starkey Road in Largo.
“We have to start with a machine recount as required,” Knight-Taylor said. If the results remain within one-quarter of a percentage point afterward, “we do a manual recount on Friday.”
A manual recount does not mean election workers sit down and reconsider every ballot cast in District 6. Instead, officials examine ballots recorded as overvotes and undervotes. An overvote occurs when a voting system detects more selections than permitted in a contest, while an undervote occurs when it detects no selection in that race.
“We’re law followers, not lawmakers,” Knight said. “During the manual, we will be looking at the overvotes and undervotes. We aren’t looking at each individual ballot again.”
Election officials then determine whether those ballots contain a valid vote that can be attributed to either candidate under Florida’s recount procedures.
With the candidates currently separated by just two votes, even a small number of ballots could matter.
Knight-Taylor emphasized that the recount will take place publicly: “Anyone can come down to the office and watch the recount,” she said.