Some school administrators will have to be a little more patient than usual to know the results of the school budget vote and board member elections next week.

Norm Green, Chautauqua County Board of Elections Democratic commissioner, said the Board of Elections will not start counting Jamestown and Dunkirk school district votes until Wednesday because of the number of absentee ballots needing to be counted following the countywide school district budget vote and board member elections Tuesday.

Green said starting at 7 a.m. Wednesday, the Board of Elections will start to count the absentee ballots for Jamestown while Dunkirk’s count will start at 1 p.m. He said the Board of Elections has also scheduled times for school districts like Southwestern and Fredonia to bring in their absentee ballots the night of the election.

“We can’t open a single ballot until 5 p.m. Tuesday,” Green said. “We have told some school districts their votes will be counted by first come, first serve. We’ve told Southwestern to be here before 8 p.m. while we’ve told Fredonia to not show up until after 8 p.m.”

Green said smaller school districts were also instructed to count their ballots themselves starting after 5 p.m.

On Tuesday, the Board of Elections is also scheduled to count the ballots for Bemus Point, Brocton, Cassadaga Valley, Silver Creek and Westfield. On Wednesday, the Board of Elections will also county ballots for Chautauqua Lake and Sherman.

School districts that will do their own count include Clymer, Falconer, Forestville, Frewsburg, Panama, Pine Valley and Ripley.

Despite counting the absentee ballots for 11 of the 18 districts in the county, Green said they will have the job finished sometime Wednesday.

“Our high-speed scanner can count about 4,000 ballots an hour,” he said. “In Jamestown, there are 17,000 voters. They will receive as many as 8,000 (ballots). It should take a couple hours to count Jamestown’s and about an hour to count Dunkirk’s. We’re not worried about making this happen. On the other hand, it’s a job. It’s not going to be easy.”

Green said the Board of Elections has already been very busy producing the absentee ballots, which the Board of Elections did for every school district, but Jamestown. He said Jamestown hired Falconer Printing to produce its ballots, which the Board of Elections worked closely with to make sure the ballots being created would be able to be counted by the high-speed scanner.

“Just opening the envelops is a task. Not only do you have to open 8,000 ballots (for Jamestown), but you have to do it without cutting them,” he said. “Across the state, many counties are doing nothing to assist their school districts. Brain (Abram, Chautauqua County Board of Elections Republican commissioner) and I felt that this is our job.”

Green said the county is charging school districts for the services they are providing so county taxpayers aren’t paying the bill.

“We are charging the school districts for everything we’re doing,” he said. “(School district officials) are finding it to be pretty inexpensive. The county taxpayers are not being affected.”

Green said for an unprecedented situation, Board of Elections staff and school district clerks have stepped up to allow for the school budget vote and board elections.

“This was pushed upon district clerks and the Board of Elections with very little time to make it happen. There was not a lot of time to plan or prepare,” he said. “The job was there and everyone stepped up to make it happen. Now I knock on wood because we’re not at the finish line yet.”

The county Board of Elections will not be posting school budget vote and board election results.