Counted Twice. Fairbanks Votes on the Machines.
"If the hand count is to check on the machines, then why do we have the machines?" Barbara Haney sponsored Fairbanks Proposition 3.
The deck
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The story
Did anyone check them? Yes. In 2025 a canvass board hand verified 3,338 ballots, two precincts of 32 plus early voting. The machines came back 100 percent accurate on that sample.
What counted as failure? The ordinance said so up front. A discrepancy over 1 percent. About 33 ballots. The gap was zero.
What does a yes do? Hand counting starts in 2027, so October 6th is still machine tabulated. The ordinance carries no fiscal analysis. A yes locks it for two years, past the Assembly and the voters.
The clerk's ballot title, the tolerance beside the measured gap, Haney's case in full and the five dates still open.
Name the result that would have changed your vote. If none would, what was the audit for?
What we verified
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Proposition 3 on the Fairbanks North Star Borough ballot is a citizens' initiative requiring all ballots to be hand counted by registered borough voters, with observation as authorized by law, and prohibiting electronic tabulation systems.
The Fairbanks North Star Borough regular municipal election is October 6th, 2026, with polls open from 7:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.
The borough's adopted factual information on Proposition 3 states that the ordinance does not include a fiscal analysis or estimate of implementation costs.
The borough's adopted factual information states that if Proposition 3 is approved the ordinance is law for two years and neither the Assembly nor the voters can repeal, modify, or negate it during that period.
The FNSB Assembly adopted Resolution No. 2026-26 approving information of a strictly factual nature pertaining to the hand count initiative petition.
The borough's adopted factual information states that a hand count typically takes longer to determine election results than an electronic tabulation system.
Proposition 2 on the same ballot is a citizens' initiative changing the date of the Fairbanks North Star Borough regular municipal election and making related changes.
Proposition 1 on the same ballot is a citizens' initiative establishing maximum allowable tax revenues.
The voter registration deadline for the October 2026 borough election is September 6th, 2026.
Early voting runs from September 21st, 2026 through October 1st, 2026 at the Noel Wien Library, 1215 Cowles Street, Fairbanks.
Absentee by mail applications are due September 29th, 2026 at 5:00 p.m.
Electronic absentee applications close October 5th, 2026 at noon.
The Borough Clerk recertified the hand count initiative on August 5th, 2026 for placement before voters on October 6th, 2026.
No published estimate exists of what hand counting would cost the Fairbanks North Star Borough.
Proposition 3 would mandate manual hand counting beginning with the 2027 election cycle, so the October 6th, 2026 election itself is still machine tabulated.
Under the initiative only registered borough voters would conduct ballot counts and official election results would be determined solely from manual hand counts.
The Fairbanks North Star Borough canvass board hand verified votes on a total of 3,338 ballots during the audit of the 2025 borough election.
Of the 3,338 audited ballots, 2,846 came from the early voting station and 492 came from the Goldstream No. 2 and Moose Creek precincts.
The audit found that the borough owned Dominion Voting Systems machines tabulated votes 100 percent accurately for the sampled ballots.
The Assembly adopted the Proposition 3 ballot language on a 6 to 1 vote, with Brett Rotermund the sole no vote.
Rotermund said the borough's approved language seems a little bit leading to him and sounds negative.
Assembly member Tammie Wilson was ruled to have a conflict on the measure because she was one of the initiative's lead sponsors.
The Assembly amended the voter information to say a hand count would instead take longer to determine unofficial election results than an electronic tabulation station.
The hand count initiative petition was submitted with 2,706 signatures against a requirement of 2,391.
The Fairbanks North Star Borough tabulates ballots on borough owned Dominion Voting Systems optical scan machines, a company now operating as Liberty Vote.
In March 2025 the Assembly deadlocked 4 to 4 and failed to renew a 219,489 dollar five year sole source contract with Dominion for ballot programming and annual licensing.
The hand count audit was created by an ordinance sponsored by Assembly member David Guttenberg that passed 5 to 4 in spring 2025.
Barbara Haney, Tammie Wilson, Brett Rotermund and Mindy O'Neall voted against the 2025 ordinance that created the hand count audit.
Barbara Haney, a former borough Assembly member, sponsored the hand count citizens' initiative.
Haney asked that if the hand count is to check on the machines, then why the borough has the machines.
Mayor Grier Hopkins said he is not excited about spending more money and not excited about less accuracy.
Guttenberg said people who think no election is honest will take nothing from the audit, and that the rest will have some satisfaction in thinking the machines are counting correctly.
Turnout in Fairbanks North Star Borough elections has consistently hovered in the 20 to 25 percent range over the last few years.
The audit covered two randomly selected precincts plus the early voting station, drawn from the borough's 32 voting precincts.
The 2025 audit ordinance created a process for what happens if a discrepancy greater than 1 percent emerges between the hand count and the machine tabulation.
Beats
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