Nevada County election officials were busy today counting more than 18,000 unprocessed ballots to add to the county’s election-day tally of 31,275. “It takes time because more than 16,000 of these ballots are mail ballots, plus nearly 2,000 provisional and damaged ballots, all of which must be carefully scrutinized by our ballot team,” said Gail Smith, assistant registrar of voters for the county. “Our goal,” she said, “is to assure that everyone who voted properly has his or her ballot counted correctly.” Registrar of Voters Gregory Diaz said balloting, processing and tabulating has gone nearly perfect thus far. “I am …