Mistakes happen.

That, Richmond Voter Registrar Kirk Showalter told the state Board of Elections, is the reason why some voters were given the wrong ballots and had trouble being checked in to vote during the Nov. 3 election.

However, she said changes are being put in place to ensure that the problems that led to numerous complaints do not recur in upcoming elections.

“I take this very seriously. I do not want any voter to be inconvenienced,” she said.

Elections can fall sort of perfection, no matter how much effort is made to prevent mistakes. With 500 people deployed to operate 65 voting precincts in the city of Richmond, something unexpected can happen, she said. It just takes one or more people to do something they shouldn’t.

“We train people, we put them in place and when mistakes happen, we assess and correct them, and the cycle begins again,” she said.

Overall, the 20-year veteran of Richmond elections noted that the process generally runs smoothly and produces results in which voters can have confidence..

Ms. Showalter offered the explanation last Friday after she and the members of the Richmond Electoral Board, C. Starlet Stevens, Ophelia M. Daniels and Cecelia A.B. Dabney, were called before the three-member state elections board to explain the problems that tarnished the election in Richmond.

James B. Alcorn, chair of the state board, indicated that the board’s aim was to get election officials to explain their problems and their plans for resolutions to help others do a better job, “even if it is uncomfortable” for those called on the carpet.

Ms. Showalter said some voters were given the wrong ballots because election officials at two city precincts, 206 at Dominion Place near Virginia Commonwealth University and 307 at Ginter Park Presbyterian Church, deviated from the procedures for which they were trained.

In both precincts, election officials checked in people without determining which Senate district they lived in. The precincts were split between the 9th and 10th Senate Districts.

At one precinct, she said, the chief election officer surprisingly — and in violation of protocol — put an untrained and inexperienced person in charge of checking in voters. That new worker did not know about split precincts, Ms. Showalter said, and didn’t check to determine what Senate district the voters lived in.

In the other precinct, an election officer told Ms. Showalter that she forgot about split precincts and checked in people who should have gone to another table to be in the right district.

“She was mortified,” Ms Showalter said.

Ms. Showalter said once she learned about the problem through telephone complaints, she said two members of the city Electoral Board were dispatched, one to each precinct, to prevent any further distribution of wrong ballots.

To prevent it from happening again, Ms.. Showalter said she will put more training emphasis on handling split precincts.

Currently, every new election officer has to go through 6.5 hours of training before being allowed to work and veteran officers are required to take refresher courses.

She also plans to spend more than $300,000 this year for new pollbooks with upgraded software that can prevent voters from getting the wrong ballot.

Ms. Showalter said that the pollbooks in at least 40 of the 65 precincts malfunctioned for 30 minutes to two hours after the polls opened, preventing voters from being checked in until the problem was corrected.

She said the problem occurred because a technician who tests the machines in advance of the election failed to perform a required practice test, but told no one.

From now on, Ms. Showalter said, two people will observe the testing to make sure it is fully carried out.

Ms. Showalter said she also will improve training to ensure that voters no longer are asked to verify an address when the address on an ID varies from that on the pollbook. She said she heard from the governor’s staff about that because Gov. Terry McAuliffe was one of the people affected.

She noted that the state Department of Elections changed that policy in August, but did not highlight it or send out a special notice.

“It slipped by,” said Ms. Showalter, adding that other registrars were unaware of the policy change as well.