Election Glitches: Ballots Run Out, Street Is Closed : Voting: Higher turnout--by about 3%--causes shortages at some Orange County precincts.

Voters at several Orange County polling places Tuesday discovered that the ballots had run out, and those heading for one site found the street barricaded at both ends.

Volunteers at about half a dozen precincts called Registrar of Voters Donald F. Tanney about 6:30 p.m., saying they had run out of ballots. Tanney said voters in line before the polls closed were asked to wait until emergency shipments arrived.

John Armstrong, 32, a McDonnell Douglas employee in Mission Viejo, said he and his wife Corinne, 37, a self-employed florist, were among dozens of people who tried to vote at 6 p.m. at the Villa del Sol senior housing complex but were told that there simply weren’t any ballots.

“They told us to come back and said if you’re here by 8 or so, we will let you stay in the room,” John Armstrong said.

The Armstrongs were able to vote at 7:45 p.m., along with about 30 people who were waiting, some of whom they had seen at 6 p.m.

“What bothered me is we asked them the number (of voters in the precinct) and they said 702. And they said they got only 400 ballots,” Armstrong said.

“That bothered me, because they knew this was going to be a heavy election. I don’t know if they were trying to save money or what. It just didn’t make sense,” Armstrong said.

Tanney said that precincts in Newport Beach, El Toro and Laguna Hills also experienced ballot shortages, but most called for extra ballots before they ran out.

“We spent past years throwing out a lot of ballots,” Tanney explained, “and this year we cut it a little too close.”

The voter turnout, Tanney said, was about 3% more than predicted, “and that’s the 3% we ran short.”

Another Election Day glitch occurred in Anaheim, where road crews had blocked both ends of Lemon Street because of construction, making the American Legion Hall polling site difficult to reach.

Arvada Spina, who lives nearby on North Helena Street, notified city officials of the problem about 10 a.m.

“We’ve got a lot of seniors around here, and it’s a long walk,” said Spina. “I just really got upset that they would do this today, of all days.”

Spina said that after contacting city officials, she went back to Lemon Street and removed one of the barricades herself. A member of the work crew drove by and yelled at her, Spina said. “I just told him that I’m going to move this, that this is voting day and you’re blocking off the polls.”

After getting transferred from one city department to another without success, Spina finally talked to city spokesman Bret Colson. “We had a supervisor go out on site,” Colson said. “The barricades were down by 11.”

The city is currently widening part of Anaheim Boulevard a block away, which involves work on side streets, including Lemon.

Added Colson: “This was a mistake.”