But even at a time when school funding has reached an all-time high, districts are apprehensive at having to spend so much more on pensions. This month, their strategy has become clear: establish separate, specific state funding for districts to cover their increased contributions. Ed Mendel of Calpensions.com has more:

… a coalition of school districts, including the giant Los Angeles Unified School District, is proposing a separate budget item for the CalSTRS rate increase within the Proposition 98 school-funding guarantee.

The change would not require the state to spend more money on schools. But the coalition thinks a separate budget item could ensure that funding for the CalSTRS rate increase, as it’s phased in over seven years, “will grow at a predictable rate” for all school districts.

As it stands now, school districts would have to pay for the CalSTRS rate increase with money from a new K-12 funding plan adopted two years ago, the Local Control Funding Formula.

No carve-out from Proposition 98

There had been speculation that the CTA and CFT would seek to have pension funding separated out from Proposition 98 spending — money the state is required to give schools under a 1988 ballot measure that guarantees about 40 percent of revenue goes to K-14 campuses. But that’s difficult under Prop. 98’s dense, specific language.

Instead, the education establishment expects to use the flexibility and extra dollars provided by the Local Control Funding Formula to pay for the higher pension costs. But that’s not what the change in how schools are funded was supposed to be about, according to its champion, Gov. Jerry Brown. The governor’s website contains a 800-word account of the signing of the LCFF law on July 1, 2013. It depicts the funding change as being solely about getting more help to struggling English-learners, the state’s “neediest students.”

Brown’s quote in the account:

“Today, I’m signing a bill that is truly revolutionary. We are bringing government closer to the people, to the classroom where real decisions are made and directing the money where the need and the challenge is greatest. This is a good day for California, it’s a good day for school kids and it’s a good day for our future.”

Then-Senate President Darrell Steinberg’s quote:

“Our disadvantaged students deserve more resources to overcome the extra obstacles they face, and this formula does just that. At the same time, we’re investing more resources in all of our students, and building on proven programs of career technical education and partnership academies to keep our students engaged and give them better preparation for college and careers. This dramatic shift in funding allows our schools to target investment where it’s needed most. By empowering our students for success, we pave the way for a stronger California.”

But the state Senate has had only Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, as president from 2008 until a few weeks ago. Steinberg left to media accolades this fall. Note this long Q&A in which the Bee reporter’s framing is consistently favorable to the former teacher.

Yet his successor, Sen. Kevin de Leon, D-Los Angeles, is off to the roughest start of any Californian assuming a high-profile office since Lane Kiffin took over as coach of the Oakland Raiders.

De Leon has gotten skeptical to scathing media responses for a relatively long list of things in a relatively short time.

More perceived screw-ups since Walters tore him up

On Dec. 4, Sacramento Bee columnist Dan Walters blasted him for a “series of blunders.”

Walters ripped de Leon for verbal gaffes that proved hugely damaging to a Central Valley Assembly Democratic hopeful; for a self-important, pompous “inaugural” ceremony in Los Angeles; and for gutting many of the Senate’s most experienced policy analysts because of murky budget problems. Insiders said if the Senate really were hurting, the logical thing to do was lay off the political apparatchiks on all Senate staffs, not the people with the institutional memory.

The knocks have kept coming since Dec. 4.

De Leon’s announcement last week that he would pressure CalPERS and CalSTRS to disinvest from coal-affiliated companies — but not those in oil or natural gas — struck a chord in the wrong way with just about everyone.

I talked to one insider who said there was disbelief among lawmakers that 1) this symbolic, hollow gesture was highlighted as an early priority of de Leon’s and 2) that de Leon wouldn’t realize this would seem insubstantial and not worthy of his time. Another Sacramento watcher told me he couldn’t believe de Leon would focus on this trivia instead of grabbing a chance to be enviros’ hero by talking up a fracking ban. New York state’s passage of such a ban last week shows how much it’s where greens want to go.

Oversight office abruptly scrapped

Then de Leon was pulverized last week by editorials in both the Bay Area Newspaper Group and its sister Los Angeles News Group over other actions as well. This is from the Vallejo Times-Herald’s version:

“De León has eliminated a team of Senate aides dedicated to evaluating state government institutions and programs. He declined to renew the Senate’s Office of Oversight and Outcomes, established in 2008 by then-Senate President Darrell Steinberg with a goal “to ensure taxpayer dollars are being spent wisely and productively.

“The four-person staff’s combined salaries of about $379,000 seemed a small price for the good it did.

“Among the reports the office produced just last year were ones on the misuse of student meal funds by school districts, including $158 million in misappropriations and unallowable charges by Los Angeles Unified; about how the state’s system for overseeing substance-abuse counselors failed to flag sex offenders; and assigning blame for problems with the $373 million state payroll system. Among earlier reports was one looking at 10 tax breaks that, over a decade, cost state coffers $6.3 billion more than anticipated.”

Accused of wide range of political sins

What’s interesting is that these criticisms of de Leon don’t just focus on money-grubbing or another particular sin that politicians sometime specialize in. Implicitly, they make quite a sweeping case.

In possibly costing an Assembly candidate a chance at victory, de Leon is accused of poor political acumen.

In staging a showy unofficial “inaugural,” de Leon is accused of grandiosity.

In his Senate shakeups, de Leon is accused in one of a power grab and, in the other, of showing ignorance of the importance of a new but respected Sacramento institution.

In thinking that going after coal while ignoring fracking would make him look good, de Leon is accused of — to be blunt — stupidity.

The Sacramento version of the Stockholm syndrome

That is a pretty sweeping bill of particulars. What’s going on here?

The most obvious problem is that de Leon is politically tone-deaf in a way that’s striking for someone who’s made such a rapid ascent.

But the less obvious problem is that a lot of times it’s not fun to cover politics. It feels sleazy, disheartening, transactional, petty and repetitive. Steinberg made it feel more principled and sincerely, earnestly progressive.

That mattered to a bigger chunk of the Sacramento media-political establishment than people far from the state Capitol might imagine. This establishment didn’t miss Steinberg’s, er, colorful predecessor Don Perata at all.

The sunk cost fallacy is alive and well in the ongoing recount requested by Assemblyman John A. Perez. The former Democratic Speaker of the Assembly claimed a spot on the medal stand for state controller, just 481 votes behind second place’s Board of Equalization member Betty Yee. (The candidate who finished first, Republican Fresno Mayor Ashley Swearengin, is guaranteed a place on the ballot. The Yee-Perez fight is for the second spot on the top-two runoff in November.)

The results were so close — one hundredth of 1 percent — that Perez exercised his right to request and pay for a recount. If the results stand, the race would be the closest statewide candidate race in California’s history.

It’s tough to lose an election. A margin of 481 votes out of 4 million votes cast sets a new standard for electoral agony. But a recount isn’t going to change the outcome. The election is over. Perez lost. A recount only prolongs Perez’s misery and undermines his political future.

Here are seven reasons why Perez should quit while he’s behind.

1. His current 15-county recount won’t be enough.

More important than the current tally is the current error rate, which isn’t high enough to overturn the results. Two days into the recount, 91 precincts have been recounted with Perez gaining at most five votes (Kern: +4; Imperial: +1). Although the sample size is small, the current rate has Perez gaining one vote for every 18 precincts (18.2).

Perez’s recount request only identified 4,103 precincts to be recounted. If our math’s right, after those precincts are recounted, Perez could expect to gain just 225 votes — not enough to change the results. (4,103 precincts / 18.2 current change rate = 225.43 vote gain for Perez)

2. Cherry-picking means the error rate is likely to get worse for Perez, not better.

At the start of the recount, the focus was on Perez “cherry-picking” counties and precincts where he outperformed Yee. “How unfair,” everyone bellowed. Now, the cherry-picking works against Perez. If the current error rate holds, Perez must expand the recount (See Point #1). But the error rate has nowhere to go but down. If he expands beyond the 15-county recount universe, he’s likely to lose votes, or at least see a lower rate of change.

The wisdom of California’s cherry-picking recount law is slowly becoming evident.

3. There’s not enough time to sequentially recount.

In addition to the error rate, Perez could fall short on time. According to a survey of county election officials, the recount — at its current pace — would stretch past the November general election. As first reported by the Sacramento Bee’s Jim Miller, “A new survey by the secretary of state’s office suggests that the recount could run through January if it includes all of the counties sought by Pérez.”

If Perez begins to pick up votes, Yee’s campaign could at “any time during a recount and for 24 hours after it concludes” request her own recount, “as long as it does not include any precincts that were recounted as part of a prior request,” according to the secretary of state’s office.

4. Democrats are betrothed to another.

At this weekend’s executive board meeting, the California Democratic Party officially endorsed Yee for state controller. The endorsement may have been required by party bylaws, but the “rousing welcome” and hospitality suite in Yee’s honor weren’t. Yee is favored among party activists, whose patience is being tried by a destructive recount.

5. He’s blowing through his campaign cash.

John Perez is blowing through his campaign cash faster than Ron Calderon at a golf resort. Recounts are expensive. For years, Democrat Bill Lockyer picked his statewide office and scared away all serious contenders by building a sizable war-chest. Perez tried to do the same thing in the state controller’s race, but his war-chest wasn’t big enough.

Every day the recount continues, Perez’s campaign bank account shrinks. Remember: raising money will be much harder now that he’s no longer speaker or the Assembly.

6. He’s cementing his reputation as a bully.

You don’t get to be the second most powerful politician in California without making a few enemies. The byproduct of Perez’s legacy as one of the most successful speakers in recent history is a reputation as a bully. This recount reinforces that image as a bully. Among some Democrats, Perez’s persistence comes across as him trying to buy (or steal) an election. Right now, Perez’s image as a bully is limited to insiders. That expands to the general public if he reaches the November run-off by an “illegitimate” recount.

7. He’d hate the job of state controller.

The worst outcome: Perez wins the recount and the November election. Perez is a political animal. (We mean that as the highest of compliments.) He thrives in an environment where there is active political conflict. He cuts deals, wields power and builds alliance.

State controller is the farthest thing from a political job. It’s low-profile number-crunching. Perez can’t alter the day-to-day functions of the state’s chief financial officer.

Conclusion: What will John Perez do?

Behavioral economists say that the best way to avoid the sunk cost fallacy is to simply acknowledge it. What are the chances Perez wises up to his self-destructive behavior?

At the beginning of his career, Perez walked away from college because he realized that he didn’t need a degree to be successful. After all that time and effort, Perez had the foresight to realize college was impeding his political career.

So he has done it before.

On Sunday afternoon, Democratic Assemblyman John A. Perez, who finished just 481 votes behind Board of Equalization member Betty Yee in the June 3rd primary, formally requested a recount in the controller’s race. Perez’s recount, which will begin in Kern and Imperial counties, could ultimately span 15 counties and decide which Democrat will face Republican Ashley Swearengin in the November run-off.

“Never in California history has the vote difference between two candidates for statewide office been so narrow, 481 votes or 1/100th of one percent, out of more than four million ballots cast,” Perez said in a statement released by his campaign. “It is therefore of the utmost importance that an additional, carefully conducted review of the ballots be undertaken to ensure that every vote is counted, as intended.”

Perez’s call for a “carefully conducted review of the ballots” is careful indeed. He’s requested a partial recount in 15 counties where he out-performed Yee. That’s in accordance with state law, which allows any voter to request a partial recount that is targeted at the precinct level.

Although the recount can be limited to select precincts, “all of the ballots in all of the requested counties would have to be recounted and the compilation of the recount in those counties would have to lead to a different candidate winning the contest before the results would be recertified,” according to the Secretary of State. 

Yee accuses Perez of “cherry-picking only 15 counties”

Yee’s campaign balked at the partial recount slanted in Perez’s favor.

“Cherry-picking only the 15 counties that he won, and sorting the precincts within the counties to reflect his strongest areas, indicates that he has no interest in a fair and impartial recount,” Yee said.

CalWatchdog.com’s analysis of the county recount list shows Perez’s margin over Yee, ranging from a high of 31 percent in Imperial to a low of just 1 percent in Orange.

1. Kern +10 Perez
2. Imperial +31 Perez
3. San Bernardino +8 Perez
4. Fresno +3 Perez
5. San Mateo +2.5 Perez
6. Orange +1 Perez
7. Ventura +5 Perez
8. Los Angeles +5 Perez
9. Riverside +6 Perez
10. Stanislaus +5 Perez
11. Tulare +7 Perez
12. Napa +8 Perez
13. Kings +9 Perez
14. Lake +7 Perez
15. Merced +9 Perez

The targeted recount can be stopped at any time, because Perez is footing the bill. A statewide recount could cost several million dollars. According to the Secretary of State’s office, if Perez begins to pick up votes, Yee’s campaign could at “any time during a recount and for 24 hours after it concludes” request her own recount, “as long as it does not include any precincts that were recounted as part of a prior request.”

That could be in the cards, based on statements from Yee’s campaign, which has criticized the unfair nature of the recount process. “No recount is going to be fair that doesn’t include more counties,” Parke Skelton, Yee’s campaign consultant told KQED’s John Myers by phone Sunday afternoon.

Independent election experts agree with Yee’s complaint, but acknowledge that under state law, Yee’s only recourse is to request her own recount.

“It’s completely unfair unless they do a re-canvass of the whole state,” Jimmy Camp, a Republican political consultant and expert on ballot counting, told CalWatchdog.com last month. “Recounts are a crap shoot no matter what.”

Perez’ strategy: Searching for invalidated votes

So, what is the Perez campaign’s recount strategy?

In addition to limiting the recount to counties he won, Perez requested a review of all unopened, rejected vote-by-mail and provisional ballots as well as precinct rosters.

“I am also seeking to review all voted ballots that were not counted in the official canvass, including unopened rejected vote-by-mail (‘VBM’) ballots and provisional ballots, and any relevant information related to those ballots, including, but not limited to, all VBM and provisional ballot envelopes containing each uncounted or rejected ballot, all precinct rosters, and any other materials related to the uncounted or rejected ballots,” Perez wrote in his recount request to the Secretary of State.

That falls in line with the predictions of an election expert CalWatchdog.com consulted last month. “One of the goals of any recount would be to get more of your supporter ballots counted,” Paul Mitchell, vice-president of Political Data, Inc., a company that specializes in election data, told CalWatchdog.com. “So, this could mean going into counties where there is a large potential for ballots that were disqualified because of signature problems, and digging through those to find any that can be challenged.”

It’s unlikely such a strategy will prove fruitful in Los Angeles County. Perez’s campaign already closely scrutinized the counting of late absentee and provisional ballots in his home county. Even Perez’s campaign acknowledged Los Angeles as a lower priority, ranking it eighth in the order of recount counties.

Potential to flip outcome, but unlikely

What are the chances that the outcome will change?

In recent years, California has seen two recounts in statewide propositions. In July 2012, a Bay Area surgeon requested a recount for Proposition 29, a $1-per-pack cigarette tax increase defeated by voters. In Dec. 2012, a recount was requested for Proposition 37, a food labeling initiative that was also defeated. Neither outcome changed with the recounts.

However, those results weren’t nearly as close as the current state controller’s race. A study by the Center for Voting and Democracy analyzed statewide recounts from 2000-2009. According to the study, “In the five cases in which the total votes cast were above two million, the margin shift was on average 0.016% of the vote (fewer than one for every 6,400 votes cast).”

With more than 4 million votes cast in the controller’s race, that tiny margin, 0.016 percent of the vote, would be 646 votes. As Yee’s campaign consultant has pointed out, that figure should be expected to be spread among not just Yee and Perez, but all six candidates who were on the ballot for controller.

“It would be strange indeed for Perez to pick up every vote in a recount with multiple candidates,” Skelton, Yee’s consultant, has said.

Entering the California Democratic Party’s spring convention, Board of Equalization member Yee’s campaign faced a juggernaut.

With more money, power and influence over convention delegates, Perez, then the Speaker of the Assembly, seemed the inevitable Democratic nominee for state controller.

“With an army of paid interns, volunteers and campaign aides — and endorsements by most of his Democratic colleagues in the Assembly — John Perez made a major push for the party’s endorsement this year,” wrote Damien Luzzo, a convention delegate and member of the Yolo County Democratic Central Committee.

Perez had a substantial advantage in delegate appointments, in part because members of the Assembly are entitled to make five appointments to the state party convention. All but six of his Democratic colleagues in the Assembly backed Perez’s campaign. Under party rules, all endorsement votes are public in order to make delegates more accountable to their appointing official or committee. That meant that, for Yee to block an endorsement, she needed state convention delegates to risk their own appointments.

Shrewdly, Yee’s campaign turned it into an advantage. While not specifically naming Perez, Yee told delegates that hardball tactics, political intimidation and a 3-to-1 financial advantage for one candidate were how Republicans won.

It also helped that Yee, who has earned a reputation as a mild-mannered numbers-cruncher on the state’s tax board, gave the best speech of her career.

“Democrats, we are just as guilty of getting sucked into the influence of money and power about which we criticize Republicans,” Yee said shortly after successfully blocking the party from endorsing in the race. “It is time we have politics shaped by our values, rather than our values shaped by politics. If not, I believe Democrats will continue to lose ground with respect to the electorate.”

The thinly-veiled criticism of Perez exposed the fault lines within the state’s supermajority party and made Perez vs. Yee about more than two candidates.

Recount?

With all the provisional and late absentee votes tabulated, Yee has taken second place in the race for state controller, besting her fellow Democrat by just 484 votes. Ashley Swearengin, the Republican mayor of Fresno, already easily secured the other spot in the run-off with more than a million votes in the June 3 primary.

The difference between second and third place, just one hundredth of one percent, is so close that a recount still remains a possibility. But now the tables have turned: Perez must face the Democratic Party’s power brokers, who no doubt would prefer to avoid a costly and divisive recount.

The controller’s race, the closest candidate race and second closest statewide election in California’s history, has remained too close to call in the month since Election Day. The day after the election, Yee lingered in fourth place behind Perez and unknown Republican David Evans.

Evans, who was largely ignored by the mainstream media and did not spend enough money to file a campaign finance report, was just 2,436 votes behind Perez, the top fundraiser in the race. As county registrars of voters worked their way through more than a million late absentee and provisional ballots, Evans temporarily claimed second place, even as Yee narrowed her gap with Perez.

In the ensuing weeks, Yee and Perez swapped insignificant leads in a race that would come down to the last votes in the last county. Yee held an 861-vote lead — before Lake County’s final 6,000 ballots were counted on Monday.

“I want to thank the voters of California for their trust and support,” Yee said in a written statement declaring victory with no votes left to count. “I look forward to bringing my extensive finance experience into the office of controller.”

Yee claims victory, but Perez hasn’t conceded

While Yee has declared victory, Perez’s campaign, as of Tuesday morning, was unwilling to concede defeat.

“There are still votes to be counted,” Pérez’s political consultant, Doug Herman, told KQED’s John Myers by email. “We look forward to the final vote count.”

Officially, Lake County held the only outstanding ballots in the race. However, Perez’s campaign may have been alluding to a possible recount that could target disqualified ballots.

“One of the goals of any recount would be to get more of your supporter ballots counted,” said Paul Mitchell, vice-president of Political Data, Inc., a company that specializes in election data. “So, this could mean going into counties where there is a large potential for ballots that were disqualified because of signature problems, and digging through those to find any that can be challenged.”

He added, “This can be particularly fruitful among older voters and foreign language voters who have specific issues with signature verification.”

Expensive recount “crap shoot”

CalWatchdog.com, the first outlet to raise the possiblity of a recount in the race, has spoken to election experts who say that a recount is essentially a “crap shoot.” Within five days of the Secretary of State’s official results, any voter can request a full or partial recount. California’s recount rules, which require the requester to pay, grant tremendous leeway for a recount to be started and then immediately stopped.

“It’s completely unfair unless they do a re-canvass of the whole state,” Jimmy Camp, a Republican political consultant and expert on ballot counting, told CalWatchdog.com last week.

Consequently, if Perez requests a recount in one of his counties, it could trigger Yee to request a recount in one of her strongholds, as a defensive maneuver.

Financial and political cost of a recount

A bitter recount would further exacerbate the divide between the two Democratic camps and allow Swearengin to gain ground. The direct financial cost could also prove to be a major hurdle. Last month, in the 31st Congressional District, third place GOP candidate Lesli Gooch, who was just 209 votes behind Redlands Mayor Pete Aguilar, requested a recount. Gooch picked up a single vote in a recount that cost her campaign $6,330. If applied to the state controller’s race, it would cost Perez $3.06 million potentially to gain the 484 votes that he is currently down.

As of the last campaign finance report, Perez had $1.8 million in cash on hand.

“Relying on grassroots and personal integrity, Yee, once again, showed that grassroots activism and her genuine personality can easily trump the onslaught of big money,” Democratic convention delegate Luzzo wrote back in March.

But if Perez mounts a serious recount effort, Yee will need to overcome “the onslaught of big money” one more time.

California State Controller: Election Results as of July 1, 2014

Board of Equalization member Betty Yee holds an 861-vote lead over Assemblyman John A. Perez, D-Los Angeles, for the final spot in the November run-off against Republican Ashley Swearengin.

What’s taking Lake County so long? According to Jim Miller of the Sacramento Bee, Diane Fridley, the Lake County registrar, “is on light duty following surgery and has only a skeleton staff to help with the ballot work.”

Average error rate: 1 in 6,400 votes

There’s been some speculation that the magic number is 645 votes. Recounts are rare, but the best available information comes from a study by The Center for Voting and Democracy, which analyzed statewide recounts from 2000-2009. According to the study, “In the five cases in which the total votes cast were above two million, the margin shift was on average 0.016% of the vote (fewer than one for every 6,400 votes cast).” Applying that rate to the current state controller’s race yields a potential 645 vote change.

But, there’s another piece of new data for political analysts to chew on: the recount in the 31st Congressional District.

San Bernardino County Error Rate: 1 of 1,278 votes

Third place Republican congressional candidate Lesli Gooch, who was just 209 votes behind Redlands Mayor Pete Aguilar, requested a recount in her Inland Empire-based race. Gooch was hoping to set up an all-Republican general election against first place finisher, Paul Chabot.

Gooch already has abandoned the recount in San Bernardino County. “Day one of the recount, which cost the Gooch campaign $6,330, tallied 1,278 votes and saw Gooch gain one vote on Aguilar,” writes Nikie Johnson of the Press Enterprise.

CD 31 applied to state controller’s race

That’s an error rate of 0.0782 percent (1 out of 1,278 votes), and if applied to the state controller’s race, would produce a statewide change of 3,156 votes. More than enough for Perez to make up ground on Yee. But, there’s no way to guarantee that the errors are in Perez’s favor. Yee is just as likely to see a recount add to her vote total.

To be clear, the sample size of CD 31 is incredibly small — too small to confidently project the error rate statewide. Again, the average margin shift from the study by the Center for Voting and Democracy, which analyzed more data, showed a change in 1 out of 6,400 votes cast.

Perhaps the more important number from the 31st Congressional District recount, which properly scales to the state controller’s race, is the cost of a recount. Gooch spent $6,330 to pick up one vote. If you apply that rate statewide, it would cost Perez $5.4 million to gain the 861 votes that he is currently down (861 votes x $6,330 = the cost to gain one vote).

Projection: Perez down as many as 434 votes

The latest projection published in Scott Lay’s The Nooner shows Perez down as many as 434 votes and up as many as 43 votes, once Lake County finishes counting. That would mean a recount cost of $2.74 million for Perez and $272,190 for Yee. As of the last campaign finance report, Perez had $1.8 million in cash on hand.

If our math’s right, that’s a very big number. California Democratic Party coffers are full, but that’s still money that could be used to pick up legislative seats in November. Even an outside benefactor, who could independently pay for a recount, would face criticism for spending heavily on the endeavor.

California State Controller Results, as of Friday June 27

While the rest of us nurse our election night hangovers, the partner with GoCo Consulting is usually on his way to a registrar of voters office to monitor ballot counting for a race that remains undecided. In 2007, Camp oversaw the recount in which Janet Nguyen flipped the results to become Orange County’s youngest county supervisor. As rare as recounts are, that alone makes him an expert witness.

Here at CalWatchdog.com, we’re closely monitoring the too close to call race for state controller. We were the first to predict that the race was likely headed for a recount. As of Wednesday, June 25 at 4:00 a.m., Board of Equalization member Betty Yee holds an 865-vote lead over Asm. John A. Perez, with just three counties and a grand total of 6,167 ballots left to count in the state. Lake County, which holds 98 percent of the remaining ballots, will decide which Democrat claims the final spot in the November run-off against Republican Ashley Swearengin, who finished first and already is guaranteed one of the two slots on the ballot.

But before that happens, a recount is all but certain. To help explain the ins and outs of a recount, Camp shares his five observations on recounts. 

1. There’s no rhyme or reason to it.

If someone says they have a strategy for winning a recount, Camp says they’re lying to you.  “There’s no rhyme or reason to it,” he says. “Recounts are a crap shoot no matter what.” That’s especially true at a statewide level, where you can pick and choose which counties to recount. “What do you do?” In the controller’s race, Camp says Perez might theoretically start recounting in Los Angeles where he did the strongest. Then again, Camp could easily make the argument for the opposite strategy. That’s because…

2. Human error is the biggest factor.

Human error is the single biggest factor in a recount, according to Camp. “There’s no bias, it’s usually just incompetence,” he says. Statistically speaking, mistakes are inevitable. And changes aren’t due to malicious acts by registrars of voters. With 4 million votes, a few hundred tabulated ballots is well within the realm of statistical possibilities. How do you know which registrar of voters — which county– is more likely to have experienced errors, and more importantly, which candidate benefited from those errors? Camps says you don’t.

Recounts are rare, but the best information we have comes from a study by the Center for Voting and Democracy, which analyzed statewide recounts from 2000-2009. According to the study, “In the five cases in which the total votes cast were above two million, the margin shift was on average 0.016% of the vote (fewer than one for every 6,400 votes cast).”

3. Start: We’re down. Stop: We’re ahead.

At a statewide level, California’s recount procedures allow candidates to pick and choose where and when the recount happens. “You can start in a certain county, and then stop,” Camp says. That means candidates could go into a county, start counting, hope the results flip, and then stop their recount. Of course, then the previous winner could restart their own recount in another county and hope the results once again flip back.

4. Recounts are completely unfair.

All of this picking and choosing makes recounts in California unfair. “It’s completely unfair unless they do a re-canvass of the whole state,” Camp says. That would be expensive, and under state law, it’s the requester who must pay. Perez raised more money for his controller campaign, but Yee is an important voice for the state’s Asian American community, which could raise the necessary funds to keep her competitive with Perez.

5. Practice the phrase, ‘Your honor’

Because recounts are “completely unfair,” Camps concludes, “It all gets challenged in court.” That means this race ain’t over even after it’s over and recounted. And that could be very bad for Democrats. An extended recount and ensuing court battle will only exacerbate the divide between Perez and Yee supporters.

Whichever Democrat wins will be deemed illegitimate by the losing side. Asian Americans, who see their influence waning, will be especially jaded if they believe Perez stole it in a recount.

That’s because, under state law, ballots must be received by the local registrar of voters by Election Day, not postmarked that day or en route to an elections office.

“California doesn’t have the infamous hanging-chad or butterfly ballot,” Paul Mitchell, vice-president of Political Data Inc., wrote in a recent op-ed piece in the Sacramento Bee. “Piles of ballots are marked ‘too late’ because the mail arrived after Election Day.”

Sacramento County Registrar of Voters Jill Levine, who has been tracking the number of “too late to count ballots” statewide, estimates that as many as 20,000 otherwise valid ballots in the June 3 primary were received too late. With more than 4 million ballots counted so far, these “too late to count” ballots make up less than half a percent of total votes cast statewide.

“The only thing worse than not voting is people trying to vote and having their ballots go uncounted,” Kim Alexander, president of the nonprofit California Voter Foundation, told the Associated Press.

Controller’s race could be decided by few hundred votes

Most races, especially at the statewide level, are decided by a margin of hundreds of thousands of ballots. But this year’s “too close to call” race for state controller could come down to just a few thousand, maybe even a few hundred, votes statewide.

“In some cases we are seeing one to one-and-a-half percent of the ballots being late,” Mitchell told KPCC. “And we’re looking at a controller’s race that right now is separated by eight-one-thousandth of a percent.”

As of Monday, June 23, Republican Ashley Swearengin has secured the top spot in the November run-off, in which only two candidates will be on the ballot. So that spot is not at issue.

For the second spot on the ballot, Board of Equalization member Betty Yee leads Assemblyman John A. Perez by 843 votes, a margin of two hundredths of one percent (0.02 percent). Both are Democrats.

The outcome is likely to decided by Lake County, which holds 83 percent of the state’s unprocessed ballots from the June 3 primary.

But does it matter?

But for all the legitimate concerns about the principle of any valid votes being discounted, could the “too late to count” ballots decide the outcome of an election? The current race for state controller, which is projected to be the second closest race in California history, is the perfect test case.

KPCC assembled a list of the ten counties with the most “too late to count” ballots. These counties account for roughly three-quarters of all late ballots in the state, according to the preliminary figures. With the overall election results for each county, CalWatchdog.com can project how those votes would have gone. To be sure, this is an imperfect projection.

The Top 10 counties are split right down the middle — Perez beat Yee in five, Yee beat Perez in five. The chart below shows how many votes Perez or Yee would have gained over their opponent in each county.

The overall projected vote difference: Perez would have gained another 76 votes, if those late ballots were counted. But as of the current statewide count, that still would not be enough to overcome Yee’s current 843-vote margin.

Again, that’s an inexact estimation based solely on geography. There are other factors to consider, such as race, age and political party, all of which could produce a more accurate projection and show that the late ballots disproportionately affected one of the state controller candidates more than the others.

Postal system

Mitchell’s firm, which conducted an analysis of the “too late to count” ballots from the 2013 Los Angeles city election, found late votes were tied to the postal routing system. San Fernando Valley voters, whose mail is processed in Santa Clarita, had a greater chance of seeing their vote arrive later than those in downtown.

In its analysis of the 2012 election, the state’s leading election data firm found that more than 30,000 voters statewide had their ballots invalidated because they were too late to count. Half of these voters were under the age of 30, according to Political Data Inc.

You can expect another analysis of this election’s late ballots, which could shed some light on whether John Perez or Betty Yee would have been helped by those ballots. That’s after Lake County finishes its count, Secretary of State Debra Bowen certifies the final election tally, and we go through a grueling recount.

Until then, just like the results itself, it’s just too soon to know whether those projected extra 76 votes would have made the difference.

The ruling’s potential impact on California public education — and public education nationally — could be immense. Even if it doesn’t stand, it will inspire similar lawsuits everywhere, and similar concerns about the proper balance of power in public schools between unionized employees of those schools, and students and their parents.

But to just focus on the California politics angle, the Vergara effect could also be immense.

From now on a litmus test for every Latino politician is whether they agree with Judge Rolf M. Treu’s comparison of California’s public school system with the formally racist segregated school systems that existed in much of America before the 1954 Brown vs. Board of Education ruling.

Will Latino pols stand up for Jim Crow Lite?

Treu goes farther than even Latino reformers like Gloria Romero in depicting the fight over teacher tenure and teacher union power in a starkly racial fashion.

I look forward to seeing how John Perez, Hilda Solis, Lorena Gonzalez, Juan Vargas, Xavier Becerra, Joe Baca, Loretta Sanchez, Linda Sanchez, Tony Cardena, Gloria Negrete McLeod, Raul Ruiz, etc., react to Vergara.

This is not a question they can finesse.

Do they want to keep an education system that the judge called functionally anti-Latino so as to stay on the CTA’s and the CFT’s good side?

Or do they want to blow up the Jim Crow Lite system the unions have built for poor Latino students?

We shall see. I will set up Nexus alerts to keep tabs on what these pols are saying — and to see if California’s Democrats have a cleansing civil war that will force party members to wrestle with the fact that the CTA and the CFT stand for a lot of things.

But social justice isn’t one of them.

As of Monday morning, two Democratic candidates were locked in a statistical tie for the second spot in the November run-off, with another candidate very close behind. Board of Equalization member Betty Yee was 351 votes ahead of  Assemblyman John A. Perez – 751,691 to 751,340. That’s a lead of 0.0001 percent.

Both have 21.7 percent of the 3.5 million votes counted for far. Each hold a slim lead over longshot GOP candidate David Evans. He has 740,576 votes, or 21.3 percent.

Republican Fresno Mayor Ashley Swearengin is comfortably atop the field after running up the score in her hometown. Under California’s top two primary system, two Republicans could make it to the November runoff, leaving the state’s 7.7 million Democrats without a candidate.

Too close to call: 926,000 ballots yet to be counted

But before Republicans pop the champagne, election officials must review 926,069 unprocessed ballots, including nearly three-quarters of a million late absentee ballots. With so many ballots left to count, it’s anyone’s race to win. After all those late absentee and provisional ballots are counted, more likely than not, the race will remain as close as it is today.

That’s because the counties with the most unprocessed ballots are almost evenly split among the three candidates. And those top six counties account for roughly 54 percent of all unprocessed ballots statewide. In Perez’s favor, Los Angeles County continues to hold the largest cache of unprocessed ballots, where he bested Yee by 5 percent. Yee did better in Bay Area counties, which are a combined equivalent to Los Angeles.

California recounts: A short history

In 2011, California Watch’s Lance Williams scoured the archives, maintained by Dave Leip’s online atlas, and compiled the state’s definitive history of close elections.

The closest statewide candidate race occurred in 1990, when former Republican Rep. Dan Lungren defeated San Francisco District Attorney Arlo Smith, a Democrat, by 28,906 votes to become attorney general. According to Williams, Smith considered a recount of the 0.39 percent margin of victory.

Lungren’s “landslide” win wasn’t the closest election in the modern era. According to Williams, a 1988 transportation bond measure, which was supported by Gov. George Deukmejian, lost by 355 votes — out of more than 5.2 million cast. That’s a 0.006 percent margin of victory.

In both of those close contests, the losing side did not request a recount, and according to California Watch’s 2011 research, there had never been a statewide recount in California’s history up to that point.

The following year, California experienced two recounts in statewide propositions. In July 2012, a Bay Area surgeon requested a recount for Proposition 29, a $1-per-pack cigarette tax increase that was defeated by voters. In December of that year, a recount was requested for Proposition 37, a food labeling initiative that was also defeated.  Neither outcome changed with the recounts.

Could the current race for controller, which might be decided by a fraction of a percent, be the very first recount in a statewide candidate race?

Get ready for a recount

Odds are there will be at least a partial recount. Under California’s Election Code, Section 15620:

“If an election is conducted in more than one county, the request for the recount may be filed by any voter within five days, beginning on the 29th day after the election, with the elections official of, and the recount may be conducted within, any or all of the affected counties.”

The key wording: “The recount may be conducted within, any or all of the affected counties.” That means that if the current margin holds, it’d be in the best interest of both losers to request targeted recounts in a select group of counties.

Democrats hold recount advantage

The biggest obstacle to a possible recount is financial — the requester foots the bill. Consequently, Perez, who raised the most money in the primary, is more likely than Evans, who spent less than $1,000 on his campaign, to have the financial means for a recount. Yee, too, could likely raise cash from her supporters to pay for a recount. She’d remain the highest-ranking Asian woman in California if elected as the state’s CFO.

Either way, with two candidates and unlimited party resources, Democrats have the advantage in almost every possible recount scenario, but one.

If one Democrat makes it into the second spot once the results are final, will California Democrats allow the loser to request a recount and thereby risk delivering victory to Evans?

Yee’s 351-vote lead over Perez is microscopic in an election involving millions of votes. If that margin remains even close to the same after the remaining ballots are processed, this race ain’t over even when it’s over.