Charlotte Observer - Another Vote in Carteret - it is possible !!!

[GetTheRightVote]

I hope they do not mind me posting it complete but hard to get too report.

Posted on Wed, Dec. 01, 2004

Carteret prepares for Jan. 11 special election

GARY D. ROBERTSON

Associated Press

RALEIGH, N.C. - Carteret County officials are confident they will be ready to handle as many as 24,000 ballots in a special election Jan. 11 to determine the next state agriculture commissioner, a county elections official said Wednesday.

Ed Pond, chairman of the county's election board, predicted many residents will be skeptical about using the same kind of touch-screen voting machines that failed to retain 4,438 votes during early voting before the Nov. 2 election.

"I think there's going to be a concern by many voters about the use of this equipment," Pond said by telephone.

The lost votes resulted in a decision Tuesday by the State Board of Elections decided Tuesday to hold a special revote in the county for those whose ballots were lost. Voting will also be open to any registered voter who did not vote in last month's general election.

Voting will only take place in the disputed agriculture commissioner's race, where Republican Steve Troxler leads Democratic incumbent Britt Cobb by 2,287 votes out of about 3 million cast.

Officials plan to use the same touch-screen machines for the revote, although they said the problems that caused the lost votes will be fixed by manufacturer UniLect Corp.

Totals from the special election in Carteret are to be added to votes from the Nov. 2 election to determine a winner.

The state board's decision to order a special election may be appealed by the two candidates to Wake County Superior Court. A lawyer for Cobb told the board he believes that state law requires a new statewide election to resolve the issue of the lost ballots.

Neither candidate has said yet whether they plan to appeal the board's decision. They have about 10 days to decide.

"We're still tying to figure out what the implications are of this," Cobb spokesman Tim McKay said Wednesday.

Troxler had recommended the board limit the opportunity to vote again to only those voters whose ballots were lost. Election officials know their identities because they cast their ballots during early voting.

State law indicates that a new election has to be held in the "entire jurisdiction in which the original election was held."

"That's fairly plain language," said Bob Joyce, an election law expert at the Institute of Government at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

But the board's order referred to the Jan. 11 vote as a "special election," a kind of balloting usually reserved for alcoholic beverage and bond referenda.

Board chairman Larry Leake, who cast the lone vote against the special election, said it doesn't matter what label is placed on the vote.

"Any time you ask folks to come again, it's a new election," Leake said, and requires a statewide vote.

The Legislature changed the law after an election was held in February 1995 for voters in a state House race in just one Duplin County precinct. Voters inadvertently had been given the wrong ballots the previous November.

Marshall Hurley, Troxler's attorney, told the board Tuesday that the Legislature gives it broad powers to operate elections. That includes ordering a partial re-vote that wouldn't disenfranchise more than 3 million voters whose votes counted on Election Day.

Joyce said the state law is ripe for a challenge: "To my knowledge it's never been interpreted."

If the special election happens as scheduled, political strategists will face plenty of questions. What will voter turnout be? Will Troxler and Cobb be allowed to raise more campaign money before the election?

Cobb, who has a beach house at Atlantic Beach in coastal Carteret, could soon be spending more time there.

"This can be the full force of a statewide election in one county," McKay said. "It's never been done."

National electoral activists have said Carteret County's lost votes demonstrate the need for electronic voting machines to provide hard copies of each voter's choices.

Leaders of a legislative committee to examine voting machine standards said Wednesday a "paper trail" for these machines is one of several issues they'll examine. The panel's first meeting is Dec. 13.

"Our mission is that we establish a system that the people feel is reliable," said Sen. Ellie Kinnaird, D-Orange. The panel could present recommendations to the General Assembly when it convenes in late January.

The cost of staging the special election has not been determined, but Pond said it would be borne by county taxpayers.