OPA has hired the world-renowned counting expert Count von Count (aka The Count) to count the results of the next election for seats on the OPA Board of Directors. The Count has no peer in the counting world.

The Count does not come cheap but it is The Count versus many hours of laborious work for some poor souls to feed perhaps 5,000 or more ballots through a scanner/computer system just purchased last year.

Contacted via a text message, The Count was incredulous when told of this counting time. “Give me 10 minutes and I will count twice, the second to verify,” he responded. “I L O V E to count.”

Some association members say OPA cannot afford The Count’s counting services. Others are counting on The Count to count efficiently and count fast.

Last year the election material mailing contractor counted the votes and simply provided OPA the results, a violation of OPA’s governing documents. The Count was not involved in that count.

The violation was revealed in a newspaper article by Ocean Pines Progress publisher Tom Stauss. Stauss asked the chairman of the Elections Committee if he was concerned about the committee not supervising the count as required. He said he was not.

Informed of last year’s violations, OPA president Larry Perrone was not amused. “The counting rules will be followed this year,” he insisted.

Thanks to Perrone, we can expect a return to counting ballots in the Community Center under the direct supervision of the Elections Committee, and the watchful eyes of any association member desiring to observe The Count count.

The Count counting should make for a memorable counting event.

The need for Count von Count was only recently realized when word leaked that a scheduled counting in May of results of a referendum to limit board spending would be counted manually. This is relatively simple for a YES/NO response. What this really tells us, however, is the referendum count can be done much faster manually than with the expensive hardware/software OPA purchased last year.

A board election count is a manual counting nightmare, for anyone but The Count. The scanner will hold just 50 ballots at a time, processing them at 30 pages per minute. If 5,000 ballots are to be counted there would be 100 stacks, each to be counted twice for verification of the count.

One board member expressed serious concern about hiring Count von Count. “It will make us look like fools,” he said.

Another board member responded, ”No. What makes us look like fools is buying a system that could take so many hours to properly count returned election ballots.”

After a grueling 12-hour debate, not counting a six-hour dinner break, the board voted unanimously to hire Count von Count to count the August board election result. Thus far the board has refused to announce The Count’s counting fee.

OPA’s software fee for the count is around $2,400.00. Rumor has it The Count wants double that to count.

A former director has filed suit in Snow Hill in an effort to break this code of secrecy surrounding The Count’s counting fee.

“I refuse to see my assessment payment used to pay this Count character that kind of money,” he said. “My extensive Google research indicates we could get The Count to count for half that amount. With your financial support, I’m counting on my effort to count down the Count.”