Published: May 18, 2006 11:43 pm      

Election results are questioned

Candidates in two Boyd races vow to contest

Catlettsburg — Candidates from at least two races in Boyd County have vowed to contest Tuesday’s primary election results.

There have also been several complaints by candidates and media organizations about the barring of media from the vote counting in the Boyd County clerk’s office with yellow tape and a posted sheriff’s deputy.

Daniel Collier and Tim Thompson, two of the Catlettsburg Democratic city council candidates for Ward 2, said Tuesday night they planned to contest the results of their race.

Both charge their names were left off ballots given to voters in at least one precinct in Catlettsburg.

Incumbent Phillip Caldwell, who according to unofficial results secured the most votes to win the race, said he had no plans to contest the results.

Collier said Wednesday he had filed a complaint with the Attorney General Greg Stumbo’s office and was in the process of securing legal representation.

“My complaint to (Stumbo) was about my name not being on the ballot and the clerk’s office giving the poll workers the wrong information as to who lived in what district,” Collier said.

“I also only received one vote and I know my wife and myself both voted for me. I know that there’s something fraudulent that needs to be investigated.”

According to Boyd County Clerk Doris Stephens Hollan, no candidates were left off the ballot. Instead, she said poll workers were confused about who was eligible to vote in the city race in the Hampton precinct in Catlettsburg. In addition, the electronic voting machine was also initially set up without a city race.

The Hampton precinct, Stephens said, is a controlled precinct, meaning that there are voters in the precinct who do not live in the city of Catlettsburg and are not eligible to vote in city races as well as those who live in Catlettsburg and are eligible to vote in city races. There was also confusion about which Catlettsburg ward voters were eligible to cast ballots in.

Hollan said the ballot was corrected after only 17 voters had cast votes at the Hampton precinct. And she said that the unofficial vote totals released Tuesday night, by human error, did not include votes cast after the correct ballot was placed on the machine.

“(The machine) was right; workers didn’t know what voters to set the machine for those races based on where they lived,” said Debbie Leibee, election supervisor. Therefore, some voters did not get to vote in races they were eligible for, she said.

The same thing occurred in the Courthouse precinct, Leibee said, but she could not provide an estimate on the number of individuals affected.

According to precinct-by-precinct preliminary results released by the clerk’s office Wednesday, 131 voters cast ballots in the Courthouse precinct.

“It’s really ‘nobody’s fault,’” Leibee said. To correct the problem in the future, Leibee said she has requested a roster of registered voters from the state showing a list of voters by Ward in Catlettsburg.

Preliminary results released by the county clerk’s office Tuesday for the Democratic Ward 2 council race showed Collier receiving only a single vote, Caldwell with 23 and Thompson with 11.

Correct totals, according to Hollan are:

Phillip D. Caldwell 94

Daniel C. Collier 13

Tim Thompson 17

Thompson could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

Preliminary results provided to the press Tuesday night for the republican council race in Ward 2 were also incorrect for the same reason, Hollan said.

Vote tallies reported Tuesday showed candidate Philip Wellman beating out Lisa R. Epling by a vote of one to zero.

Correct results are:

Lisa R. Epling 8

Phillip Wellman 13

Neither Epling nor Wellman could be reached for comment Wednesday.

Election results are being questioned in several other races in Boyd County.

Jan Spears Michel, who lost in the circuit clerk’s race to Linda K. Baker by a mere 48 votes, said she was also seeking legal counsel and had filed a complaint with Stumbo’s office.

“I think that the machines need to be impounded and a total thorough investigation done on the whole thing,” she said. “There are just too many questions floating around. I want a recanvass and a recount. ... I’m going to do that to get the answers for myself and the voters of Boyd County.”

Michel said she also had a “problem with the media being locked out of the vote counting process.”

“It doesn’t look good when you shut the media out. I don’t think it’s a wise thing to do. This is America. We don’t shut the media out of things. ... We just need the answers and whatever it takes to get the answers, it needs to be done for now and the future.”

According to Hollan, the decision to tape off the clerk’s office from the media and public was made by the Boyd County Board of Elections at the suggestion of Sheriff Terry Keelin and officials from Harp Enterprises, the company that sold Boyd County its new electronic voting machines.

Hollan said officials were concerned that the extra people and materials attributed to using two types of voting machines in the small space would lead to congestion in the clerk’s office and interfere with poll workers returning materials.

“We just had an awful lot to keep up with,” Hollan said. Results were not able to be tallied the same way they were in the past for the simple reason that two different voting machines were used, she said, adding that the press would not have been able to get any information results until votes in both machines were tallied and final numbers accumulated.

“They have 25 years experience. Why should they be overwhelmed? There was literally crime-scene tape over the doors leading to the clerk’s office. The electronic reporters were allowed (in) but not the print people,” said Kevin Gunderson, a candidate and current Ashland City Commissioner.

WSAZ’s Randy Yohe was the only media representative who had access to the clerk’s office, Hollan said, simply because he was there during business hours before the polls closed. When election workers returned he was asked to leave.

“I think we ran a good election and everything went according to the way we thought it would,” Hollan said.

Results are also being questioned by Bobby Jack Woods, who received 206 votes less than winner Debbie Jones in the Boyd County Clerk’s race.

Woods said he has not decided whether or not to take any legal action yet such as requesting a recanvass or recount. Woods said he is concerned over the discrepancy in totals between votes cast for the commonwealth’s attorney and county clerk races and all other county races.

“Between my office and the commonwealth’s attorney’s office there were 300 additional ballots cast,” he said. “Where did these votes come from? Why would you walk in and not vote in any other race? I’m not saying there was anything wrong or illegal I just want to know where those numbers came from. I may ask for a recount so we can make sure all those numbers mesh together.”

According to Patsy Casey, executive staff adviser in the election division for the Secretary of State, each complaint by candidates would have to be looked at on a case-by-case basis.

“All (complaints) have to be investigated on some level. Each person would have to get their own legal counsel to find out what happened. If they have questions about their precinct, they would have to talk to the State Board of Elections and the county clerk,” she said.

Vicki Glass, Director of Communications for the Office of the Attorney General, said she was not allowed to give out the names of counties complaints were received from. She said the state voter fraud hotline received 184 complaints, most of which involved vote buying and selling.

The State Board of Elections did not return phone calls Wednesday.