NORTHEAST TALLAHASSEE, FL (WTXL) — A 24-vote margin between second and third place in Tallahassee's City Commission Seat 3 race is heading to a machine recount.
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P.J. Perez leads the race, but whether Tom Derzypolski or Talethia O. Edwards joins him in a runoff now moves from election night to the recount process.
The narrow margin of 0.06 percentage points between Derzypolski and Edwards falls within Florida's threshold for a machine recount.
Leon County Supervisor of Elections Mark Earley said the numbers from Tuesday night were only the beginning.
"They will affect the number is currently posted yet as I try and express everybody election night results are not even unofficial their first preliminary result. In some instances there could be other races that did not look to have a recount suddenly would maybe have a recount," Earley said.
Earley said election-night totals are preliminary and the recount could have implications beyond who finishes second in the Seat 3 race.
"We want to express the will of the people through the ballots," Earley said.
Neighbor Christopher Daniels, a professor, said the recount process means going back through the results and accounting for ballots that may still need to be considered before the numbers are final.
"When you go through a recount process, you know you're gonna have different ballots. You're gonna have all the initial results reanalyze. There's gonna be provisional ballots. Is it gonna be some mail in ballots. There's gonna be some people that came in ballots that maybe came in right at the last minute, so hopefully, you know, as those results come out, it's a transparent process," Daniels said.
The Leon County Canvassing Board is expected to meet Thursday and Friday as it reviews the results and determines which races require a recount. The machine recount is set to begin Saturday at 8:30 a.m. and will be open to the public.
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