As a hand recount of 61 absentee ballots stretched into the wee hours of the morning, it became clear that all but 10 came from the vote-rich Culkin precinct – the largest in District 1 and in Warren County.

&#8220I thought Culkin would be my strong suit,” said David McDonald, two-term supervisor for the district who had been four votes behind in the Republican primary when the absentee tally began.

When it ended, he was 15 votes ahead of challenger John Arnold, according to what Circuit Clerk Shelly Ashley-Palmertree called &#8220an unofficial unofficial” tally at 1:45 a.m. today.

McDonald had gained 39 votes and Arnold 20 from voters who cast their ballots in advance of Tuesday’s primaries, ballots that are not counted until after polls close. The tally put McDonald ahead 989 votes to 974.

Thirteen affidavit ballots are yet to be counted from those who found themselves purged from the voter rolls for one reason or another. McDonald remained confident enough of getting the nod for a second term that he joined others suggesting a culinary pursuit.

&#8220We need to go to Waffle House or something!” he said.

Results were slow in coming into the Circuit Clerk’s Office because poll managers at Warren County’s 22 precincts brought in their information in person instead of first phoning in machine totals, Ashley-Palmertree said.

It was another aspect of the changing face of conducting elections since Mississippi opted for purchasing touch-screen devices made by Diebold Election Systems.

Previously, optical scanners allowed for more concise sample ballot information and less paperwork for poll managers to process when polling places closed.

In 2005, Warren County supervisors voted unanimously to accept the machines – but not without caveats about how Secretary of State Eric Clark handled the proposal.

At the time, Clark said a task force heard presentations by 10 vendors and progressively narrowed the selection to Diebold. Sealed bids were then opened and the company was low bidder at $3,112.50 per machine, including a real-time printer to allow voters to see confirmation of their ballot selections in ink on paper.

A few instances of the printer paper getting jammed were reported, but the day largely went smoothly until the District 1 supervisor race got too close to call and an absentee ballot jammed a scanner.

That took things back another generation – to hand-counting.

The state’s allocation to Warren County was 91 machines, with the county purchasing 53 more to cover its 22 polling stations with an average of about six each and several spares.

An added wrinkle in the swift overhaul of the way the state handled elections was the centralization of the voter rolls.

Design glitches such as counties having access to other counties’ voter rolls and other information were discovered, with Warren County’s information systems chief David Rankin meeting with Diebold and state officials numerous times in the months that followed to sort out the problems.

Board President Richard George, who worried after voting to accept them that the county would lose control of its elections, stayed by McDonald’s side for the duration of the hand-count.

&#8220Technology is supposed to make things easier?” George said aloud, a grin upon his face. &#8220Eric’s on Diebold island right now!”