Montgomery County’s recount is set to begin Friday after businessman David Blair fell behind incumbent Marc Elrich by only 35 votes in the race for the Democratic nomination for the Maryland county’s executive.
Gilberto Zelaya, a spokesman for the Montgomery County Board of Elections, said preparations are underway at the Germantown Recreation Center 鈥� the location for the second tally of the votes.
鈥淲e鈥檙e still going to do some rehearsal. It’s almost like putting [on] a Broadway show, and we’re going rehearse kind of the process for the staff,鈥� Zelaya said.
Zelaya said only Board of Elections staff can recount the ballots, so all but two of the office鈥檚 96 employees will be a part of the process.
Since the county is short of the staff it needs, a request for help has gone out to the board of elections in neighboring counties. The goal is to have 50 teams of two counting the ballots.
The board hopes that the office will know how 鈥渕any of our neighboring jurisdictions could roll up their sleeves to help us out,鈥� and how many tables can be set up for counting.
Day One of counting will begin at 9:30 a.m. on Friday and end at 7:30 p.m. The teams will return on Saturday to continue the counting.
鈥淲e will be using Day One, which will be Friday, as a benchmark to see, to kind of ascertain how many days it could take to complete the recount,鈥� Zelaya said.
Zelaya said . The public is also encouraged to see democracy in action by either watching the recount鈥檚 livestream online or by coming to the Germantown Recreation Center to see it happening in real life.
鈥淭here is a livestream, but there’s nothing like observing it in person,鈥� Zelaya said.
