LAWYERING UP AND SLOWING DOWN AS COLUMBIA COUNTY COUNTS ABSENTEES
Don Moore
ccSCOOP News
04-09-09 - The first day of counting absentee ballots in the final phase of the Scott Murphy–James Tedisco election battle got underway yesterday in Columbia County at the headquarters of the county Board of Elections in Hudson—and at BOEs throughout the ten counties of the 20th Congressional District—and while the pace was exceedingly slow, the outcome from one perspective was striking: Murphy had 55 votes to Tedisco’s 13.
The total number of ballots examined on Wednesday was 112, since the Board was able to get to only seven of Columbia County’s 58 precincts. Sixty-eight ballots were counted; the remaining 44 ballots were challenged and set aside to be argued over later before State Supreme Court Judge James V. Brands. By one observer’s recollection, Republicans initiated an “overwhelming number” of the 44 challenges to absentee ballots during the day. |
|
Democrats on the left, Republicans on the right—the count of the absentee ballots begins at Columbia County BOE headquarters in Hudson. Republican Election Commissioner Don Kline stands at the right, while Democratic Commissioner Virginia Martin stands with Deputy Commissioner Hilary Hillman at the head of the table.
|
The county Board of Elections will continue counting Thursday, and then leave off for the Good Friday holiday and return Monday. It was unclear Wednesday afternoon what effect Judge Brands’ already scheduled meeting with both sides in court Monday, April 13, will have on the schedule of the counting. But it was clear that, at the current pace, it could take at least another two weeks to complete the recount in Columbia County.
National Republican Congressional Campaign Committee chair Pete Sessions said in a statement Wednesday, “Rest assured that Republicans will ensure that the integrity of the election is protected and every vote is counted.” From what unfolded in Columbia County, he accurately represented the activity of his partisans. According to observers and inspectors for the Democrats, it appeared that every absentee voter who had a second address was challenged.
Republican attorneys and political data-base specialists with their Democratic counterparts were arrayed around three tables, accompanied by official election inspectors appointed by each party, local Democrat and Republican leaders, and the two Election Commissioners for Columbia County—Republican Don Kline and Democrat Virginia Martin. More than twenty in all participated in the slow, expensive process of determining whether or not an absentee ballot envelope would be opened and the ballot counted, or would be set aside.
Kline and Martin had the final say on each ballot challenge. If they both overruled the challenge from either Tedisco or Murphy lawyers, the ballot was counted. If one Commissioner sustained the challenge, the ballot was set aside. Each stood by or ranged around the tables and then, with each challenge, followed the lead of the candidate’s attorneys. During the day, the counting was visited by Greg Fingar, Chair of the Columbia County Republican Party, and his counterpart, Chris Nolan, Chair of the Columbia County Democratic Party. Hudson Fourth Ward Supervisor William Hughes (Dem) also stopped by.
The Tedisco team includes attorney Vincent Messina, Jr., of Central Islip, NY, who was the Town Attorney in Islip for twelve years; and William Paroli, Jr., a New York State Conservative Party Committeeman and former Dutchess County Clerk, who lost in a disputed election in 2000, attempted to have the election run over, and lost in NY State Appellate Court.
Murphy’s group is headed by Thomas J. Garry, described as “an authority on New York State Election Law” and Chair of the Nassau County Democratic Committee, and Laura Bianco Sword, a New York attorney and long-time Democratic campaign advisor.
Don Moore is a writer and communications specialist living and working in Hudson, New York. Among his career turning points are stints as an education journalist, congressional staffer, arts administrator and lobbyist, and higher education communications and development manager.
|
