SIOUX FALLS S.D. (KELO) -- This week, Minnehaha County Auditor Leah Anderson gave her 2024 General Election recap presentation to the Minnehaha County Commission, which included a list of possible legislative improvements to the ballot counting and reporting process. In her presentation to commissioners, Anderson said she's "working in conjunction with South Dakota Canvassing Group, Rick Weible and several legislators on a few bills to help improve the absentee voting process." After polls closed at 7 p.m. Nov. 5, Minnehaha County election workers were counting ballots more than 14 hours later in South Dakota's largest county. Some state lawmakers criticized the lengthy delay in Minnehaha County reporting election results. On Tuesday, Anderson shared her election recap with commissioners. Kwik Star coming to Madison in 2025 Election Observations Anderson, who has previously said the amount of absentee ballots and issues with the IT department, played a role in delaying election results from being reported, stated that UOCAVA ballots and absentee ballots take additional time to properly count. "Our absentee voting and our ballot processing for that takes for sure double the time as it does for a regular Election Day voter," Anderson said. "I would say that's at a minimum because all of the UOCAVA ballots take approximately triple the amount of work and time due to recreating the ballot." UOCAVA stands for "Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act." Anderson said in 2020, Minnehaha County saw 611 UOCAVA ballots whereas in 2024 they saw 751. She said one of the reasons the UOCAVA ballots took longer to get done in 2024 compared to 2020, stating that one of the main reasons was South Dakota Codified Law 12-19-10 which requires the board to enter the names on the election poll book. Adding that in 2020, they didn't enter the names into the election poll book. "Not only did we have more UOCAVA ballots in this election, we also took more time processing those ballots," Anderson said. In 2020, the county had a total of 93,430 ballots (51,888 on Election Day and 41,542 Absentee) compared to 2024 which saw 95,683 ballots (66,976 on Election Day and 28,707 Absentee). Anderson added that can also add county staff visited 28 care facilities over 2 weeks to help with in-person absentee voting. Proposed Improvements Anderson listed several improvements she believes will make the election process run smoother. Anderson said due to limited space the max she believes they could have working on absentee ballots was around 60 people, but one solution she proposed was having a complete second shift. "That's not going to speed up the time, but it's going to bring in fresh workers and so having a complete second shift that would come in and including supervisors would be an improvement," Anderson said. She added another improvement is to process the largest UOCAVA precincts (04-16 and 05-16) first instead of throughout the day. Murder charges pending in Windom New Year’s stabbing Anderson said they should review their results reporting process. "What we started with for this election was two tabulators for absentee ballots and two for election day. Our goal of course was to start processing those absentee ballots on the tabulators early in the day, but the time that it was taking the absentee board to work through those ballots made it not possible for us to start tabulating the ballots," Anderson said. Anderson added typically they wouldn't start reporting results until all the absentee results have been uploaded. Stating she would like to see those results uploaded as they cross the absentee tabulator and would be willing to work with the IT Department on that process. Commissioner Comments Outgoing Commissioner Jean Bender asked whether the process could be improved with more tabulators or more equipment for workers to use. Anderson responded saying she wasn't in favor of adding another tabulator. "Having another tabulator on election night for the selection would not have sped up the process," Anderson said. "The process was delayed because of the quantity of absentee ballots that we had to process not having more equipment." Bender also praised Anderson and all the election workers for their hard work. Bender said Anderson did a good job highlighting how much work goes into making an election work. Commissioner Joe Kippley said he concluded the absentee ballot counting process needed to be more of a single-piece flow, like an assembly line in a factory. "The delay in getting the absentee ballots run through the tabulators was not due to staff, or not having the tabulators ready, it was due to the ballots going through the absentee process and coming to us ready after they went to resolution, so that was the delay, once those ballots were ready to be tabulated we tabulated them," Anderson said. Proposed Legislative Changes Anderson said she has been working on specific bills that would assist Minnehaha County. She added her priorities were looking at our in-person absentee voting timeframe, the UOCAVA process and trying to come up with a better process for recounts. "When people can come in and absentee vote in person up until the Monday prior to the election and we are printing the registration lists on Saturday prior to the election, there is a window where we can't capture what happens on that Monday." Anderson said." I just think we need to tighten up that process and prevent that from happening." Anderson said ending absentee voting on the Friday prior would also better let them utilize that Monday prior to the election. She added they have seen one person that they know of that did vote twice on Monday in person and on the election Tuesday. Jill Franken, Volunteer President of AARP South Dakota, said during the public comment portion said they are in support of early absentee and in-person voting and not shortening this timeframe, no excuse for absentee voting, accommodations to voters with disability and those in assisted living facilities and increase language access for non-English speaking voters." She continued saying AARP opposes restrictive voting changes including limits to early voting periods, witness requirements for mail ballots, and attempts to limit voter assistance. Weible said SD Canvasing has summited 31 different bills to the South Dakota Legislature.