Last minute ballots continue to be counted in Santa Clara County

SANTA CLARA COUNTY, Calif. (KGO) -- Last minute mail ballots and provisional ballots are still being counted after Election Day in Santa Clara County. It's a county office that faced problems a few years ago.

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Why does it seem like Santa Clara County is slow when it comes to counting votes? All 932 precincts have to send the ballots here to the registrar of voters before they're counted. A spokesman says he believes they're the only county to do that in the Bay Area. Another reason is the vote by mail ballots being turned in on Election Day.

"Seventy-two percent of our voters vote by mail. So obviously when those vote by mail ballots come back we need to check the signatures on those envelopes before we can open them. And checking signatures on 72 percent of 788,000 ballots takes quite some time," said Philip Chantri, SCC registrar of voters.

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Workers will be counting ballots 24 hours a day until all the votes are counted. And mail in ballots postmarked with the date from Election Day and received by Friday will also have to be counted. They're expecting a lot of votes, with a 50-to-60 percent turnout. In 2012, just 38 percent of voters participated in the primary.

The election has to be certified by July 7.