This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
The Senate gave final passage Monday to a bill that could allow the public to discover more quickly the winners of close elections.
HB21 unanimously passed and is on the way to Gov. Gary Herbert for his signature. It would allow county clerks to update vote counts daily with by-mail and absentee ballots that arrive after Election Day.
Currently, state law makes county clerks wait up to two weeks until the official canvass, with final results, before they release any updates.
Recently, the winner of the Salt Lake City mayoral race was in limbo for nearly two weeks as thousands of ballots were counted but the tallies could not, under state law, be reported to the public until the canvass.
The same was true of several races in the 2014 election, including a handful of legislative races and U.S. Rep. Mia Love's win over Democrat Doug Owens, which had uncertain outcomes until the totals of all the absentee ballots were announced.
"We will know before the canvass date who the winners are," said Sen. Howard Stephenson, R-Draper, the Senate sponsor of the bill. That can allow winners to work on transition earlier. In legislative races, it could allow winners to participate in leadership elections.
The measure passed the House with one vote in opposition — from Rep. Francis Gibson, R-Mapleton.
— Lee Davidson