Results slow to trickle in? No problem with vote counting, says Elections Alberta

Elections Alberta says it is not experiencing any problems with vote counting, despite results slowly trickling in, in some cases hours after polls closed Monday.

Nearly two-and-a-half hours after polls closed at 8 p.m., some constituencies had only counted ballots from one or two voting locations.

“We’re not seeing any issues at this time, but understand people are keen to see the results,” Elections Alberta spokesperson Robyn Bell told CityNews by email.

“Processing the votes takes some time. The hand count of today’s ballot is occurring.”

Fewer than 500 ballots were counted in Calgary-West by 10:30 p.m. In Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo, 128 votes were counted by that time. It was 243 ballots in Calgary-Bhullar-McCall.

Elections Alberta also refuted reports there were issues with the automated tabulators breaking down.

“We are uncertain where this information is coming from,” Bell said.

Albertans online complained about the seemingly slow vote tabulation.

“People need to be fired at elections Alberta. Especially in Calgary for the slow election results,” tweeted Doug James.

“Elections Alberta the loser tonight. Crazy slow voter count,” wrote Jake Vermeer.

“Elections Alberta trying to avoid being a national embarrassment with the slow ballot counting,” tweeted Lauren.

The apparent lack of speed was also noticed by some in other provinces.

“Elections Alberta is so slow…” tweeted McGill University professor Daniel Béland.

“Quebec: We can give you an election result in 10 minutes. Alberta: We counted four votes in 30 minutes,” tweeted Mathieu.

“The slow count in Alberta with so few eligible voters per riding compared to Ontario and Quebec is surprising… especially when advance polls are done by a tabulator,” tweeted Lindsay Maskell. “The count is now the story since it isn’t clear – especially in Calgary for most of those races.”

Find full election results here.