Voter confidence in King County's election system plunged lower with the revelation that an elections employee filled out a report showing all ballots were accounted for in the November election when, in fact, they were not.

Faith in the county's election system is eroded by the fact that Nicole Way, who oversees absentee ballots, and her boss, Garth Fell, assistant elections superintendent, prepared a report that failed to use all available information to verify the mail-ballot figures.

Presenting the report to the canvassing board was equal parts bad judgment and lack of skill in using a new county computer system.

It is important to understand, however, what the action represents and what it does not.

From what is now known, neither Way nor Fell tried to affect voting or change the outcome of the election. They did not stuff the ballot box or try to turn away valid votes. None of that.

Working on deadline, they reported the only number they thought they had by adding the number of ballots accepted and rejected to calculate ballots returned. The methodology is seriously flawed because it does not account for misplaced ballots and it does not take advantage of a new computer system.

King County has a long way to go to improve its policies and bolster voter confidence.

The better approach is to use the computer system for counting and cross-referencing, which is how several other counties do the work.

The mail-ballot report represents more trouble at county elections but it does not amount to a falsified document, as we understand how things transpired. The state Republican Party Web site proclaims King County elections officials admit fraud. They do not.

From the information currently available, this action, embarrassing, sloppy and indefensible as it is, does not rise to that level.