Philadelphia's official count begins Friday. Here's what happens at the canvass

Philadelphia's election results start becoming official Friday. At 9 a.m. on Nov. 6, the City Commissioners, who serve as the county Board of Elections, begin the canvass and computation of votes at their office at 11311 Roosevelt Blvd. They will "continue until completed," and challenges to absentee, mail-in or provisional ballots will be heard there if needed, according to the board's canvass notice.

Election night numbers are unofficial. The canvass is the step that turns them into the totals the state certifies. It also settles final turnout and margins in the closest local races.

Where the count stands

The commissioners' results page was last updated at 3:20 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 4, with 1,698 of the city's 1,703 divisions reporting (turnout details). It showed:

• 493,761 ballots cast;
• 106,215 by mail and 387,546 at polling places;
• no provisional ballots yet.

That is about 11,300 more mail ballots than the morning update we reported Wednesday. The board had received 108,966 mail and absentee ballots by the 8 p.m. Tuesday deadline (status update), so about 2,750 received ballots are not in the results. The results page does not say how many of those are still in process, how many were set aside for problems, or how many belonged to voters who surrendered a mail ballot and voted at the polls.

By our math, 493,761 ballots out of 1,104,061 registered voters is 44.7% turnout, up from the 43.5% in our district-by-district turnout story, which used earlier figures. The Inquirer, using Wednesday afternoon numbers, put the city near 44.6%, compared with about 47.4% in 2022. Commissioner Seth Bluestein told the paper, "we're not done counting" (Inquirer).

What happens at the canvass

The board has posted its procedures (mail ballot procedures, voting machine procedures). In plain terms:

• Mail ballot envelopes are checked against the list of mail voters. Envelopes with a missing signature or another problem go to a second review by senior staff or the board.
• Some envelopes are held back: those of voters whose ID hasn't been verified, until it is; those of voters who died before 7 a.m. on Election Day; and those under a formal challenge, until the challenge is decided.
• Ballots that could identify the voter are set aside. That covers a secrecy envelope with marks that reveal the voter's identity, party or candidate preference, or a ballot with no secrecy envelope at all.
• A list of envelopes to be examined is posted publicly or given to observers.
• Double-voting check: staff compare the mail ballot list with the poll books and refer possible cases to the District Attorney's Office where appropriate.
• Polling place ballots: Police brought the voting machines' sealed paper-ballot containers, poll books and USB drives to the board's Roosevelt Boulevard warehouse on election night. Starting the next morning, staff verify the seals, remove the paper ballots, shuffle and bundle them by division, and store them under a police guard until the computation.
• Provisional ballots are gathered from the polling place materials and reviewed after Election Day. Voters who couldn't fix a flawed mail ballot could vote provisionally, and the state Supreme Court has ruled those ballots must be counted, WHYY reported.

The closest race in the city

The canvass matters most where margins are small. In the Far Northeast's 170th state House District, Republican Rep. Martina White led Democrat Rob Gurtcheff 10,038 to 7,494 in the 3:20 p.m. update (state House results). That seat lies entirely within the 10th Council District, represented by Brian J. O'Neill, as we reported. Neither city charter question was close; both passed by more than 250,000 votes (results by district).

The dates ahead

• Friday, Nov. 6, 9 a.m.: canvass begins at 11311 Roosevelt Blvd.
• Monday, Nov. 9: last day for voters whose mail ballot was flagged for ID to provide it. Without it, "the Board cannot count your ballot," the commissioners say (notice).
• Tuesday, Nov. 10: last day for military and overseas ballots sent by Nov. 2 (voter calendar).
• Monday, Nov. 23: under state law, county boards must certify results to the Secretary of the Commonwealth no later than the third Monday after the election, according to the Brennan Center's guide to Pennsylvania certification.

You can check whether your own mail ballot was counted at vote.pa.gov. We'll report the certified results when the board finishes.