By Susanne Baremore
I am sharing some of my observations of events leading up to last week’s election in Shasta County, as I believe the community, elected leaders and agencies need to know how catastrophic the process was this year.
I’ve been a registered voter for nearly 39 years. Never have I held concerns about the security of my vote, until now. I’ve observed elections in Shasta County consistently over the past three-and-half years, and in five other counties and 12 other states.
There is an elephant in the room: Clint Curtis, who was appointed to run this local election, does not know how to do his job. Brent Turner, who he hired to be his assistant, also does not know how to do the job. What could possibly go wrong?
A lot.
Many of us, including me, did not receive our confirmation text after dropping off our ballots. Ten days after dropping off my ballot, I called the ROV’s office to inquire about the delay. Assistant ROV Brent Turner took my call, and explained there was a delay in texts going out because of all the “new processes” being developed. I found Turner’s words unconvincing and subsequently called the Secretary of State about the issue. About 30 of my friends made that same call. A day later, we all received our texts.
Leading up to the election, there was no written plan for how the election would be conducted. A written plan is considered a ‘best practice’ by Hart Intercivic, the company providing voting machines in Shasta County, as well as the Secretary of State. I asked multiple times for the document.
I was told by the Assistant ROV on October 20th that the plan was going through final reviews for spelling and grammar and would be forwarded to the Secretary of State by “Thursday or Friday” and put on the website shortly thereafter. On Monday, October 27th, I reminded Turner via email about the document and was thanked for the reminder. I called each subsequent day that week asking for the document, and was finally told October 31st, it should be up on the website at ‘any moment’. I’m still waiting. I have since seen what appears to be a page-and-a-half of what Turner told me was a 20-page memo. That page-and-a-half was written with all the skill of a 4th grader turning in a book report on a book they did not read.
On Tuesday night, as the polls closed, there seemed to be a delay in transporting ballots to the ROV office. I was unable to determine why, despite asking both Curtis and Turner.
As ballots were sorted into stacks of 50, a new chain of custody was utilized, which took up significant time to bag, label, move, and re-sort the ballots. This caused an additional delay.
Another delay occurred when Hart machines needed to be rebooted every two hours, a process which shut down the machines for 30-40 minutes each time. This was due in part to Curtis failing to seek input from staff on the purchase of new machines and purchasing them without power backup.
Running an election involves significant problem-solving, and there were already many problems needing solving by the time the polls closed on Tuesday. In a strange irony, Benjamin Nowain, a former county employee, allegedly fired at Kevin Crye’s direction, was tapped twice to help trouble-shoot minor issues. This is how deeply institutional memory has been disrupted in the department. I spoke to several employees who believe this will be the last election they will work, as the workplace has become so untenable, unstable, and difficult.
Another employee was told to stop working Tuesday night so that Curtis’ new scanning processes could be better highlighted. He referred to his new ballot processing as “the star of the show.”
In another move which meaningfully delayed processing ballots, Curtis chose not to contract with Runbeck, Inc. to have software available to open the ballot envelopes on the Agilis machine, so ballots had to be opened by hand with a different device. Opening envelopes by hand was also not accounted for in any of the processing time estimates.
Remember the written plan I mentioned? Here’s where it would have come in handy. Part of why the Registrar’s estimates for processing ballots were so wildly unrealistic is because not all the processes for scanning ballots were considered. Curtis told staff he calculated each team and machine should be able to run about 1,000 ballots per hour. From what I observed, just the two people counting ballots and another running them through the scanner, that calculation could be feasible. But that calculation did not include handing off sealed bags from the overseer to the first counter, the time to cut open the bag, the handoff to a second person, who in addition to scanning ballots, also had to write down information on a clipboard before handing off the ballots to a third person, who in addition to counting the ballots, also had to seal them back into a bag, and both that person and the person running the machine had to sign the seals on each bag. This process took between 7-8 minutes, on average.
If there had been any kind of preparation or ‘dress rehearsal’, these process times would have come to the ROV’s attention well before election night. Multiple employees told me that this process will not be realistically scalable to next year’s primary election, with many more races on the ballot.
On Wednesday, I arrived at the ROV office at 9:29 a.m. Curtis arrived at 9:44 a.m. You know who could be counted on to arrive timely the day after an election, even while being terrorized by many of the same observers who were hired under Curtis’s “social experiment” until 3 a.m. on election night? Former ROV Cathy Darling Allen.
All Turner did that morning was sit at the front desk. I personally know three people who have been assistant ROVs, and I have never seen one of them sitting down the day after Election Day. Joanna Francescut, the former Assistant ROV and our next ROV, was constantly in motion the day after an election.
While watching extra help employees tear tabs off envelopes, (a task that usually occurs on election night), Curtis asked me, “Which employee do you think is doing the best?” I deferred, telling him, “Teamwork is what makes this process work.” He then asked me who was doing the worst job, and said he would “execute” them.
When I relayed this story to an employee, I was told, “Yeah, he says weird stuff like that,” and told me Curtis made a comment in front of multiple staff that they should “throw voters into the trash compactor.”
While hanging out at the front desk instead of working, Curtis and Turner openly argued in front of staff and the public about when to hold a press conference. Brent used multiple forms of profanity, including, “Friday is a shit day for a press conference. Let’s do it Thursday.”
All but four extra help staff were sent home around 11 a.m. on Wednesday, and told not to come back in until Friday. Any comments the assistant ROV has been perpetuating about employees causing delay are simply untrue. I personally watched Turner give the group of extra-help staff a nice little ‘kudos’ speech as he was dismissing them for the day. Fully half the extra help employees are the same election deniers who claimed they could do the job better.
The rest of the week, I was privy to many conversations regarding the conditions in the office, as told to me by election volunteers, employees, other county staff, and members of the public. I cannot share all that I learned out of concern for the well-being of the employees, but I will provide a few examples.
I was told Curtis allegedly makes it a regular practice to ask subordinates to perform various tasks related to his job, because he lacks the knowledge and expertise required in working with election systems. The employees are making a habit of educating him about county policies, which center around working out of classification.
Curtis parks in two-hour restricted parking instead of using County parking, and spends time regularly feeding the meter, because he refuses to use the online app for it.
I was told by multiple employees and volunteers they have been asked to perform tasks in unsafe ways. When surveillance footage revealed Curtis having his non-employee wife perform manual labor after hours, members of the public compared his treatment of her to a “pack mule.” The comments I heard about tasks Curtis has ordered people to do left me believing she was not alone in that.
Staff are concerned Clint is spending through his budget. Staff predicts there will not be enough funds for supplies and payroll/stipends for June 2026 election.
During the Secretary of State’s surprise visit last week, Curtis demonstrated he did not know the difference between duplicated ballots (ones which needed to be duplicated in order to run them through the machines, usually from spills and such) and adjudicated ballots (where elections workers need to determine the voter’s intent on the ballot). While giving Secretary of State staff a tour, Curtis described a room where ballots are securely stored until they are destroyed 22 months post-election, as, “This is where ballots come to die.” An elections staffer had to clarify the purpose of the room considering his rather crass interpretation of Cal. Elections Code § 17502(b).
Employees described Curtis’ “new” systems as costly, inefficient, unnecessary, a fiscal misuse of funds, and no more effective than previous processes. Multiple times I heard employees—ones who have worked a multitude of elections—say Curtis’ process is not scalable for bigger elections, and they express concern for what that means for the future of our county’s elections.
Curtis has demonstrated a concerning lack of understanding of ADA issues at polling places, as reported to me by poll workers and others. This specific lack of knowledge on Curtis’ part is potentially a very costly liability for the county. See Cal. Elections Code § 19245.
Clint Curtis is allegedly attempting to promote someone in the department who does not meet the minimum qualifications for the position, potentially opening Shasta County to future discrimination lawsuits.
At one point on Friday, I took a phone call from someone who was standing outside the ROV’s office, and they saw a drone hovering over them, for approximately 3.5 minutes, seemingly observing their movements as well as the general vicinity of the ROV office. It was not discernible to them who was operating the drone.
I have been told that a post-election Logic and Accuracy Testing scheduled for 11/10/25 currently is not prepared for observation, despite the fact it is legally an observable activity.
Curtis attempted to tell me that there are no longer “security issues”, hence, why he did not need to hire additional security for the election. I corrected him on that point, advising him that the “security issues” are now EMPLOYEES IN THE BUILDING—a man who carried concealed a firearm at the elections office prior to assaulting someone less than a block away from that elections office in March 2024, a woman who has referred to many in the community as “uncircumcised Philistines,” two people who have been seen multiple times each following me, and a person who vandalized my car.
The only real positive to all this observation has been the full-time elections staff themselves. They continue to amaze me with their knowledge, effort, and dedication, even under these extremely stressful conditions. Both Curtis and Turner should be utterly ashamed of themselves for the way they have treated their employees, as well as the sanctity of our elections.
The Board of Supervisors should be ashamed for making such a reckless and irresponsible decision on our behalf, and they should call for both Curtis’ and Turner’s resignations.
Lisa Jensen contributed to this editorial.
Susanne Baremore, Redding
Editor’s note: One sentence of this letter to the editor was revised for accuracy at 8:18 p.m. on 11/10/25
