At 9:40 p.m. Tuesday, cheers rang out through the lobby of East Lansing City Hall.

The first batch of ballots had arrived.

As the media began splashing a map of the United States with red and blue in favor of President Bush or Sen. John Kerry, respectively, East Lansing officials were just beginning the count.

At 7:30 p.m., a half hour before polls closed in East Lansing, calls from voters and election officials were still trickling into the office. One woman even dropped off an absentee ballot at 7:50 p.m., while a group of volunteers continued to count them at City Hall.

As of 11:20 p.m., ballots had been counted in two of the 17 East Lansing voting precincts. Out of 3,276 registered voters, 1,797 cast a ballot. Kerry dominated the precincts with 1,136 votes, while President Bush took 626 votes. Independent candidate Ralph Nader came away with 17 votes.

For days, city staff members have organized the absentee ballots in preparation for breaking each envelope's seal on Election Day, said volunteer Jennifer Reid, daughter of East Lansing City Clerk Sharon Reid.

"(People) really have no concept of how much man power and effort goes into it," said Jennifer Reid, while walking down a corridor in the basement of City Hall. "A lot of people are coming in and not getting paid because they believe in people's right to vote."

Even city administrators took part in the action.

Jim van Ravensway, East Lansing planning and community development director, drove out to precincts that needed a refill on ballots.

"It's a family affair," he said about the staff pitching in.

Mark Grebner, chairman of the Ingham County Board of Commissioners, said he was impressed by the efforts of staff members.

"The city manager was out in the dorms and he was moving a voting machine," he said.

Grebner said East Lansing officials successfully snuffed minor problems before they grew into unmanageable dilemmas.

East Lansing Human Resources Director George Lahanas said he was impressed by the voter turnout and lack of problems he saw while touring the polls earlier in the day.

"There's no ebb," he said. "It's a continuing line of people."

But some voters who contacted the office did not leave with the answer they hoped to hear.

A city volunteer informed Japanese senior Leslie Boker that she was not registered in East Lansing. Boker got up from a chair and made her way to her car for the two-hour commute to Montague.

"I guess I'm on a road trip now," Boker said. "I'm glad I have a full tank of gas."

Despite similar delays, energy and laughter filled the halls of the Ingham County Court House Tuesday evening as employees from the county clerk's office worked to tabulate results for local, state and national elections.

"It is a pretty relaxed atmosphere," Ingham County Clerk Mike Bryanton said. "We are not used to having this lengthy of a delay."

The first boxes of ballots arrived around 10 p.m., - an hour after results usually begin to be calculated, officials said.

Bryanton said several factors contributed to the delay.

"It is a combination of volume and the challengers being present - slowing down the process at the end," he said. "And perhaps the workers having to handle provisional ballots."

As of 11:20 p.m., Ingham County officials had votes from 19 of the county's 159 precincts counted. Out of the 17,977 registered voters in the precincts, 13,048 ballots were cast. There are 197,213 registered voters in Ingham County.

For votes to be counted, ballots along with other election materials were sent through a four-step process.

"When the precincts finish, they will bring in their poll books and ballots," said Ingham County Elections Coordinator Charlene Corrigan.

"The cases will be opened by the receiving-station inspectors," Corrigan said. "Then they will put a number on it and then transfer it to one of three tables that go over everything - they go over the poll book and the ballots are put into a poll box."

After the ballots are put into a poll box, they are taken to a room in the back of the courthouse and counted, she said.

"Then the ballots will be put into a counter," Corrigan said. "When that is done a summarizing sheet will come out and be put into a Board of Canvassers envelope."

Results for the national and state elections were handled at the local level and then sent to state powers, officials said.

"A written report is faxed to the Bureau of Elections," Bryanton said. "There are no official numbers until the Board of Canvassers certifies the results."