Without this information, the online voting program was unable to sort votes by district.

Only a couple of hours earlier, council members had discovered that the registrar's data did not include this crucial information.

The election was originally scheduled to begin at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday and conclude at midnight on midnight on Friday, but the council extended the election by a few hours to account for the time lost as members filled in the missing information for first-years.

The problems facing council elections were compounded by glitches in the online voting program for Eliot House.

Eliot House residents found that they could only vote through the program by hitting "Return" instead of entering their birthdates and ID numbers. Some found that they couldn't vote at all.

Michael J. Epstein '00, an Eliot House resident, said that he was one of those who was turned down by the system.

Hawkins said that those who wrote the council detailing their voting problems were allowed to vote by e-mail.

Epstein, however, said he feels the e-mailed ballot option was insufficient.

"In any case, an election in which you cannot vote by following the directions calls for an immediate cancellation of the results, no matter what," he said.

Elected council member Todd E. Plants '01 of Eliot House said he agreed.

"I think the situation was very poorly handled," Plants opined. "The result is inaccurate and I would support it being retaken. We have to really take a look at how we do voting as a whole."

Despite the problems, the council reported that the results showed an average voter turnout from Eliot House. The percentage of Eliot House residents voting in the election was comparable to returns in other Houses.

For now, election results have been released for all districts, excluding the East Yard. The new East Yard election began yesterday at 12:01 a.m. and will conclude Tuesday night at 11:59 p.m.

This year's election glitches are only the latest in a series of difficulties that have troubled the council in the past few years.

In February of this year, the council was forced to resort to paper balloting during special elections to fill vacant seats in 11 districts.