June 7, 2013
VICTORIA – Elections BC is asking the media to help inform the voters of voting area 018 in the Vancouver-Langara electoral district about an incident that occurred on Tuesday, May 14 – General Voting Day for the 40th Provincial General Election.
After the completion of the initial count of ballots at Sir William Van Horne Elementary School, according to Elections BC procedures, an election official transported the ballot boxes for the voting place to the district electoral office at 203-8268 Granville St. Upon arrival at the district electoral office, the ballot box for voting area 018 was unaccounted for.
A letter has been sent to all residential addresses within the voting area. We are reaching out to the residents of voting area 018 in Vancouver-Langara to ensure they take action to protect their personal information. The nature of information in the voting book varies:
The ballot box contained:
The Vancouver Police Department and the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner have been advised.
All of the district electoral office supplies and voting materials were returned to the Elections BC warehouse on Wednesday, June 5, allowing us to conduct a final search for the missing voting book. This final search did not recover the voting book.
We sincerely apologize for this incident and encourage voters of voting area 018 in the Vancouver-Langara electoral district to forward their questions to Privacy Officer, Amie Foster at 1-800-661-8683 or Amie.Foster@elections.bc.ca. Questions may also be forwarded to the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner at 250-387-5629.
Keith Archer, Ph.D.
Chief Electoral Officer
British Columbia
Attachment: Vancouver-Langara voting area 018 map