Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap expects signature verification done by midday Wednesday

Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap is confident signature verification of mail-in ballots turned in on election day will be completed by midday Wednesday.

Heap told reporters Tuesday evening that signature verification of the mail-in ballots that had been turned in so far was completed by 11 a.m. Tuesday.

He added that staff were just waiting on mail-in ballots turned in on election day, which were expected to arrive by 9 p.m. Heap explained that 50 staff members would process those as they came in before signature verification began at 2 a.m.

“I think internally at our office, we’ve done quite a bit to improve signature verification. I think both our accuracy and speed,” Heap said. “In the previous elections we’ve run, we’ve been able to cut that time on processing late earlies from days down to hours. So, I think we’ll have signature verification done by midday tomorrow.”

 

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The recorder also highlighted a new option voters have to bring their mail-in ballot to voting centers, show their ID, get their signature verified and put their ballot through a tabulator to be counted then and there.

“We don’t quite have the numbers yet on how many people took that, but it seems like a sizable number,” Heap said. “The more people that verify with ID and tabulate at the polling center, that’s going to save us a lot of time on signature verification on the back end. So, hopefully quite a bit faster.”

He was hopeful with the new system that some of the more significant races might be able to be called Tuesday night.

“A lot of people, that’s ultimately what they want to see is ‘can you just tell us who won’,” Heap emphasized. “Unless the races are very close, we may be able to do that. If they’re extremely close, we do have a curing process.”

He explained that the process involved contacting voters who signatures did not pass the verification process over the next few days and giving them opportunity to get their ballot cured and tabulated.

Heap added that besides a few technology issues with setup in the morning and a power blackout knocking out two or three sites, things have been running fairly smooth.

Justin Heap previews general election

The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors approved a settlement agreement with Heap on July 13 after months of bitter litigation over who controls election operations.

The recorder was not worried about the settlement going into the general election, stating he thinks the changes will be made without a noticeable impact for voters. 

“Mail-in ballots are still going to go out. We’ll have early voting and emergency and day of voting,” Heap said. “The conflict between the board and I was primarily about who does the law assign different portions of the election to. … Based on what the courts have said, we reached a resolution. So now early voting will be run by the recorder’s office instead of the board of supervisors.”

Heap noted that there will be a lot of changes put in place between the primary and general election.

“Essentially, the board needs to comply with the what they’ve agreed to, and that’s going to mean transferring staff and systems back over to the control of the recorder’s office. We anticipate we’ll have that done before the general election,” Heap said. “And if not, fortunately the settlement agreement has some pretty quick mechanisms where if there is any further conflict, we can get those resolved very quickly without having to go back to court and and continue this this fight.”

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