MISSOULA — The Missoula City Council Ward 6 race resulted in a dead tie between incumbent Sandra Vasecka and Sean Patrick McCoy.
The recount — which took place on Wednesday, November 30, 2023, was called after a petition from Vasecka.
Missoula County Elections Administrator Bradley Seaman explained that a recount is the best way to check the machines and check the votes by a hand count.
“So this process is really about double checking our equipment in close elections. We want to make sure that the way the voters voted is the way that it’s marked on those ballots — the way the machines read through, so that’s why these laws exist," Seaman said.
- RELATED: Missoula City Council Ward 6 candidates react to tie vote
- RELATED: Missoula City Council to decide Ward 6 representative at December 4 meeting
"As we were going through there could be differences where machines may read things differently than humans and vice versa. I think that really counts for those discrepancies as to what the machine had read, compared to the human reading through as we went through this it was a process of compiling all of the ballots," Seaman continued. "We counted sorting them, and then after sorting them going through each of those with observers from each party here to make sure that everything was accurate."
One question that arose from the recount was how rare is it for a recount to end in a dead tie? Seaman says that since he’s joined the county he has not seen one.
“So, I’ve never experienced it in my tenure now since I’ve started in 2016. However, we were kind of checking back for when’s the last time we had a dead tie in Missoula County, and we haven’t been able to go back through previous elections. I haven’t found it," Seaman told MTN News. "But I do know that it happens and statewide it has been happening and that’s why we have both laws in place for recount as well as clarification on what to do when there is a tie vote."
One vote could have separated the two candidates and would have resulted in a loss or a victory for the Ward 6 City Council seat. Seaman explains the importance of voting.
“It’s so clear every ballot counts and every vote counts. I think the next area is that it’s hard to get information — and so for voters who may have voted for the mayor, but not voted for city council — as we look at that, it could be that it is a lack of information about what city council representatives do how they impact you in your community and is one of our biggest hurdles that we struggle with elections is getting out information that is accurate."
But it’s not just Seaman who runs the elections in Missoula County. He says it’s also important to thank those who were there during the recount.
“It’s so important that we take a second to say thank you to the people involved in this process our elected officials our candidates our observers media people here to help share this information we can’t run elections without a village," Seaman said. "We saw that clearly right now and it’s so important that we have people engaged and partners process. I know that everybody here in this room we asked them they felt confident in our process as they were leaving."
The decision on the Ward 6 seat will now be headed to the Missoula City Council to appoint either Vasecka or McCoy.
