Galvin probing Boston election

Secretary of State William F. Galvin notified Boston election officials yesterday that he has launched an investigation of the city's handling of the primary election Tuesday.

Boston was forced to conduct a public tally Thursday of some 2,700 ballots that had been overlooked in the Second Suffolk District Senate race. For reasons that remain unclear, ballots for the write-in race were not counted or simply were not entered on tally sheets in eight of the district's 73 precincts.

The problems raised serious questions about the conduct of the election citywide, and city officials said they expect Galvin's office to review the election process throughout the city. He will look at the training of poll workers, ballot-counting procedures, and other elements of the election process, they said.

``I think the issue on Tuesday was disturbing because it was so blatant," Galvin said in an interview yesterday.

One of the candidates in the Senate race, Sonia Chang-Díaz, said she has begun procedures to initiate a districtwide recount. Chang-Díaz, a 28-year-old schoolteacher, lost to incumbent Senator Dianne Wilkerson by 692 votes after the public counting Thursday and acknowledged that another tally of the votes is unlikely to yield a victory for her campaign.

But Chang-Díaz said she was proceding with the action because she wanted to expose any other problems.

``There were a disturbing number of problems with the Election Day count, ranging from serious discrepancies in the standards used to count the ballots at the precinct level to precincts not counted at all," said a statement she issued, adding that the city Election Department took appropriate corrective action Thursday. ``Ensuring peoples' faith in our voting systems is something worth fighting for, no matter who the winner is in the end."

To get a recount, Chang-Díaz must submit 50 valid signatures to the secretary of state from each of the 10 voting wards in the district, which includes Chinatown, Fenway, Jamaica Plain, Mission Hill, the South End, Roxbury, and parts of Back Bay, Beacon Hill, Dorchester, and Mattapan. She has until 5 p.m. Monday to submit the signatures.

Mayor Thomas M. Menino said he plans to cooperate in any recount or effort to review the election. ``We want this to be an election where there's no irregularities and no questions about the process," he said.

Wilkerson declined to comment on the recount effort. The 13-year senator declared victory hours after the election and again after the public counting, saying ``My work is now focused on November, so that we're victorious again."

She, Chang-Díaz, and two others waged sticker and write-in campaigns, meaning that poll workers had to hand-count the estimated 25,423 ballots cast in the district and handwrite the results on tally sheets for City Hall. Elections officials discovered early Wednesday morning that workers in eight precincts failed to do that.

Campaign volunteers for Chang-Díaz said they observed numerous problems in other precincts, including workers in at least six polling places attempting to leave without counting ballots.

City officials declined to comment on specific events cited by Chang-Díaz volunteers.

``The city expects that the secretary of state's full investigation into Tuesday's election would address any complaints made," said Jennifer Mehigan, a spokeswoman for the mayor.

It will be the second major investigation by Galvin's office of city elections in recent years. In 2003, he found numerous violations, including understaffing of polling places, campaigning too close to the polls, and inadequate provision of privacy for voters as they cast their ballots.

Last year the US Justice Department sued the city, alleging that election workers improperly influenced and coerced Hispanic and Asian-American voters with limited English skills.

City officials agreed to federal oversight of elections through 2008.

Donovan Slack can be reached at dslack@globe.com.