Hundreds of voter guides dumped in Elk Grove trash bins. Elections officials investigating

Sacramento County elections officials are investigating how hundreds of county voters’ guides ended up tossed into Elk Grove neighborhood recycling bins.

Nearly 800 of the county voter information guides were discovered Tuesday inside bins in Elk Grove neighborhoods, elections officials said Thursday. County elections officials received word of the bundles on Tuesday and notified U.S. Postal Service officials. Roughly 780 guides were rounded up and remailed Wednesday to their intended addresses, elections spokeswoman Janna Haynes said Thursday in a statement.

No ballots were involved in the incident, but Haynes said county voting officials are “working closely with local, state and federal officials to investigate how this incident occurred and are working to prevent any future incidents.”

Jonathan Szeto lives in Elk Grove’s Bilby Ranch neighborhood where trash is picked up on Mondays. He posted his find to his community’s Nextdoor account: six bundles of the voters’ guides stacked in his garbage bins that he found about 8 a.m. Tuesday, and called Elk Grove police.

“The trash collection in my neighborhood is Monday,” Szeto said Thursday via email. “I discovered six stacks of voter information guides and sample ballots in my garbage bins on Tuesday. They were bound together with white string.”

Szeto snapped a photo; his wife called police on Wednesday, who scooped up the bundles for the trip back to the post office.

Haynes, the county elections spokeswoman, said the voter guide dump may be a first.

Residents have reported not receiving the deliveries in isolated incidents but “this I don’t think has ever happened,” she said. “This is on a larger scale.”

Sacramento County elections officials are encouraging residents to report suspicious postal activity to the U.S. Postal Investigation Service National Law Enforcement Communications Center. The telephone number is 877-876-2455.

Voters who have not yet received ballots or their county voter information guide can call the elections office call center at 916-875-6451 for information.