(a) Notwithstanding any other provision of this chapter or regulations adopted by the Department, a Department of Elections may open absentee ballots in public meetings beginning the Friday before the day of the election in order to prepare them for tabulation. The Department shall notify each party on the ballot that they may have challengers at the meetings during which the Department opens the absentee ballots. The challengers may challenge ballots as provided elsewhere in this title.
(b) The Department shall appoint teams composed of an equal number of Democrats and Republicans to open and duplicate ballots.
(c) The teams shall open ballots by election district, check them off against the list of absentee voters, duplicate ballots that the team determines that the tabulating equipment cannot read and then secure the opened and duplicated ballots along with the envelopes in a carrier envelope. The teams shall record the number of the carrier envelope and the election district number on a log sheet that it shall also secure in the same carrier envelope.
(d) Teams shall duplicate ballots by marking them according to the voter's intent as shown on the ballot marked by the voter. If a team cannot determine a voter's intent, they consult the director and deputy director for advice and guidance.
(e) When duplicating ballots, the teams shall assign the same unique identifier to the ballot that they duplicate and the duplicated ballot. After the team has duplicated ballots for an election district, the team shall put the ballots that the team duplicated in a separate envelope and put it in the carrier envelope for the election district and the team shall put the duplicated ballots with the ballots that the Department shall tabulate on the day of the election.
(f) The Department shall secure the carrier envelopes in locked cabinets until opened in a subsequent public meeting to insert additional ballots or to tabulate the ballots on the day of the election.