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Problems with the state’s voter database are keeping dozens of absentee ballots from being mailed. The problems arose earlier this week after the state preformed routine maintenance on the database. As Whitney Ray tells us, the state says the problems have been fixed, but some supervisors of elections are still having doubts.

This box contains 300 absentee ballots ready to mail, but they were almost delayed after a computer glitch shutdown the state’s voter database Tuesday and most of Wednesday.

“When a little window of time opened up yesterday afternoon, we raced to do everything,” said Heather Conley.

The problem began after scheduled maintenance created a glitch corrupting some voters address information. Leon County Supervisor of Elections Ion Sancho says the system is still spotty.

“We have to have excellent address to do this process right without threatening individuals with potential disenfranchisement,” said Sancho.

Sancho says the problem needs to be fixed by Friday so poll workers can test the system before early voting begins.

And if there still are problems with they database Monday, when people show up to cast their ballot it may be hard for poll workers to access their voting information. The Florida Division of Elections says that as of 2:00 Thursday the problem was fixed.

“When we found that there were some data issues, we found them, we addressed them, they’ve been corrected and everybody should be running at 100 percent right now,” said Jennifer Davis, a spokeswoman with the Division.

So far the situation has only slowed down the distribution of 100 absentee ballots and the delay isn’t significant enough to keep those ballots from returning before Nov 2nd, but with Florida’s history of disenfranchising voters, solving the problem early is crucial. Voters have until November 2nd to turn in their absentee ballots, so a one or two day delay shouldn’t stop those votes from coming in.