Prop 3 passes in manual recount: 934 yes to 919 no votes

The result of Proposition 3, the Community Housing Fund real estate transfer tax to create affordable housing, is finally decided after a Friday morning manual recount at the Suffolk County Board of Elections. The final tally is 934 to 919.

It has been more than three weeks after the Nov. 8 election, and Islanders have had seesawing results with the initiative appearing to lose by eight votes on election night, winning by 13 votes after the early vote and absentee ballots were tallied and mixed information on whether a recount would be necessary.

Republican Town Chairman Gary Blados reported that one no vote had failed to be picked up by the machine in ED3 because it was marked in red ink. But in ED2, a vote was turned from no to yes when the ballot revealed that was the intention of the voter.

The need for the recount was confirmed by Town Attorney Stephen Kiely who said that because the last tally showed the trigger for an automatic recount had passed only one of two requirements.

The initiative passed the percentage threshold of 50.35% yes votes to 49.65% no votes. But the second criteria was that the Proposition had to pass by at least 20 votes and that margin wasn’t reached triggering the recount.