TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Nov. 6, 2008 – It won’t rivet the nation like hanging chads, but one Florida race could be headed for a recount: Amendment 3, a tax break for homeowners who make their homes more wind resistant or energy efficient.

In unofficial results Wednesday, 60.4 percent of voters supported the measure, which would allow homeowners to add things like solar panels or storm shutters without upping their property taxes. Because constitutional amendments require 60 percent approval to pass, that would fall within a half-percent margin that triggers an automatic machine recount.

But the gap could change after several counties, including Broward and Hillsborough, finish counting a few precincts. Manatee County also had an estimated 50,000 absentee ballots left to count on Wednesday, Secretary of State Kurt Browning said. Other counties also are examining and counting late absentee ballots and provisional ballots.

“We’ll be monitoring the results,” said Jennifer Krell Davis, a spokeswoman for Browning.

The secretary’s office must certify election results and decide on recounts by 6 p.m. Saturday. Elections supervisors have until noon that day to report all votes.

Under machine recounts, all ballots in a race are rescanned. If that tally falls within a quarter percent, then canvassing boards must manually recount any ballots rejected by the machines for too many or too few marks and add valid votes to the final result.

Copyright © 2008 The Miami Herald, Curtis Morgan and Fred Tasker. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.