Sec. 9-299. Counters. Certificates. Declaration of vote. - Connecticut Statutes

      Sec. 9-299. Counters. Certificates. Declaration of vote. At each election, each registrar shall appoint from one to five persons as may be necessary for each ballot box in his district, ward or town, who shall make the official count of the ballots in such box and of the stubs in the stub box. In appointing such counters, the registrars shall, upon request made to such registrars at least three days before the date of such election by the town committee of any party nominating candidates for the offices to be voted for at such election, and which has an organized state central committee or other similar form of state organization, appoint one counter to represent such party. Immediately after the ballot boxes are closed at such election, and not before, the counters shall, in public meeting, count the ballots and the stubs found in such boxes. In case of doubt or dispute as to the reading of a ballot or whether the ballot should be rejected for any cause, the moderator shall decide. All ballots rejected shall, after being endorsed upon the back thereof by the moderator with the cause of rejection, be preserved in a separate parcel, securely tied or sealed, and returned to the box with the valid votes. The official counters, immediately after the count is completed, shall, under their hands, or the hands of a majority of them, deliver to the moderator a certificate, in duplicate, stating the number of ballots found in the box and, in case more than one box was used, the number found in each box, giving the number of ballots rejected for any cause and the number of votes counted for each candidate and office, respectively, and the number of stubs found in the stub box. The moderator shall, before adjournment, publicly declare the result of the count. Absentee ballots shall be counted at the same time and in the same manner as the official paper ballots.

      (1949 Rev., S. 1071, 1146; 1953, S. 776d.)

      Duties of moderator are quasi-judicial; moderator not liable in damages for errors. 79 C. 678; 82 C. 324. Cited. 102 C. 583. What official certificates of count given to moderator in election of selectmen should contain; duty of moderator to endorse certificates. 104 C. 401. Cited. 129 C. 501.

      Town clerk has no duty to make return under Sec. 9-320 until the moderator has signed and delivered the certificates as provided in this section and Sec. 9-300. 18 CS 69.