Pinal County certifies 2022 Primary Election results, investigates what went wrong

FLORENCE, Ariz. - The Pinal County Board of Supervisors certified their Primary Election results on Aug. 12. It comes following an onslaught of complaints and issues this election season.

The Vice Chairman for the Board of Supervisors, Jeff Serby, tells FOX 10 he did approve it, but was reluctant to do so.

"I personally was not satisfied because I know that people did not get to vote. We're not happy about it, but there's nothing we can do about it," said Serby.

Primary Election Day in Pinal County on Aug. 2 was fraught with issues, with many polling places running out of ballots. Their elections director was fired, and they are hiring an outside elections expert to review what went wrong.

"There's some conspiracy theories that this was manipulated from above. I think it was just some ineptitude that happened and why there were not checks and balances to catch that, we're gonna look into all that," said Serby.

The ballots were canvassed at the Board of Supervisors meeting in Florence.

"The canvas is certifying the numbers, and you are statutorily required to have that done within 10 days of the Primary, today is the 10th day."

Present at the meeting was the county's new elections director, Virginia Ross. The previous director, David Frisk, was fired shortly after the Primary Election. Ross says they are already prepping for the General Election, and they want to hire more people in the department. Currently, there are five people, in addition to the director.

"Bring in as many experts as we can and put them in areas that I worked on that I think need more attention than what we had before and I'm gonna be meeting with county manager to look at that organization structure," said Ross.

The county already waived the costs for running municipal elections in 11 cities and towns. They'll also be undergoing an administrative review. Serby says they want to restore public faith in their election system.

"People gave their life for this right to vote.. come back, make changes, come to the polling place and make sure your vote is heard," he said.

There is a meeting scheduled for Aug. 17 at the historic Florence courthouse. They want community members to come here, tell them their experiences, so they can figure out what went wrong.