There has been significant social media chatter about some document shredding at the Jim R. Miller Park Event Center in Marietta, Georgia where our Elections Department had previously conducted the state-ordered re-tallied of votes in the November 3rd election.

The shredding company routinely responds to the Elections Department following an election to help dispose of non-relevant materials that cannot be easily disposed of.  The company did work at the Jim R. Miller Event Center early on Friday, November 20th, and helped dispose of the following items:

• Mailing labels (with voter info) that are incorrect or if we’ve printed too many
• Copies of apps printed from OnBase if we are looking for something (the originals are filed in evidence)
• Copies of outdated or changed procedures, policies, forms, notes, or form letters
• Regular and third-party envelopes with voter info on them
• Reports when we are finished doing ‘check off the list’ steps
• Sticky notes and phone messages with voter phone #s or email addresses
• White privacy envelopes after the election is certified.
• Printouts of old emails when we have a more current response in the chain
• Duplicates of faxed applications (when voters fax multiples copies of the same app all at the same time)
• There were a tub or two of applications we had copied for the December election and labels that we put in the shredder when the elections were combined and moved to January 5th

“None of these items are relevant to the election or the re-tally,” said Elections Director Janine Eveler.  “Everything of consequence, including the ballots, absentee ballot applications with signatures, and anything else used in the count or re-tally remains on file.  After an out-of-context video was shared on social media we contacted state officials to reassure them this was a routine clean-up operation and they could come to inspect our stored materials if they wished.”

Elections workers remain at the Jim R. Miller Event Center to help prepare for the January 5th runoff.