Secretary of State Dave Scanlan, seated, shows ballots to attorney Paul Twomey, representing Democrats, and attorney Rick Lehmann, representing Republicans Thursday during Day 4 of election recounts at the state archives. (Photo by PAULA TRACY)

CONCORD – Two recounts for the House of Representatives ended with no change in outcome Thursday, but new questions were raised in some other recounts.

Secretary of State David Scanlan said there will be a continued counting of one of the recounts that flipped one House seat this week from Republican to Democrat in Manchester’s Ward 6. And the Ballot Law Commission will be asked to count 27 absentee votes just found in a Brentwood race that was decided by just 15 votes.

The House of Representatives still looks as though it is nearly equally divided between Republicans and Democrats for the next two years, but the exact split won’t likely be known for at least a few more days as the election recounts continue at the state archives in Concord.

By Thursday, the House count stood at 199-201 for a Republican majority with one of those seats being a toss-up as to who will sit for Rochester’s Ward 4. The election recount for the House ended in a tie.

It will either be decided by the Ballot Law Commission or a vote of the new House when it convenes.

Relative to the Hillsborough County State Representative District 16 (Ward 6) recount, which flipped one seat from Republican to Democrat earlier in the week, Scanlan said in a notice sent to the press that counting will instead continue.

Scanlan explained in the notice that the routine recount reconciliation process – which, for the first time, considers counts of over-votes (voting for too many candidates) and under-votes (not voting for all the candidate the ballot allows for) on both a local level and for a recount – indicated that, in part, due to the absence of overvotes and undervotes for each race on election night returns, reconciliation numbers and recount reconciliation numbers were not equal.

“Reconciliation revealed there is insufficient certainty that all ballots cast in that race have been recounted, necessitating further counting,” Scanlan wrote.