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Election recount requested
Erland asks Suffolk BOE to verify registrations of voters
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The Suffolk County Board of Elections has been requested to recanvass the results of the June 16 Village of Port Jefferson elections, Village Clerk Bob Juliano confirmed Monday. Village Trustee Joe Erland — who lost his bid for mayor to first-time challenger Margot Garant — filed the official request with Village Hall June 18.
The BOE is expected to hold the recount at its Yaphank offices Wednesday morning. That is where the three mechanical voting machines used at Village Hall have been stored — sealed — since June 16. On election night, after the polls had closed, a county election inspector and Juliano read the tallies aloud. Village Trustee and candidate Virginia Capon observed the procedure. Then the machines were sealed, according to law.
In addition to the votes recorded on the three machines, 75 certified absentee ballots were counted.
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| | | Village Trustee Joe Erland with Village Clerk Bob Juliano at Village Hall on May 12 when nominating petitions were due. Erland ran for mayor but lost. Now he has requested a recount. File photo by D. Willinger. (click for larger version) | |
The closest contest in last week's vote was between first-time challengers Ken Brady and Adrienne Kessel for trustee. Kessel won by a margin of 45 votes, including absentee ballots.
Erland's letter requests the verification of the registrations of all voters "at the time of the vote."
Deputy Commissioner Jean O'Rourke of the county board of elections said Monday the BOE would conduct the recanvass "pursuant to election law." O'Rourke has seen requests for recanvass "a number of times" since joining the BOE in January 2003, she said.
The job of making sure the tallies from the three machines and the absentee ballots are the same as taken on June 16 is not expected to take much time. However, given that 2,355 persons voted in the village elections last week, the task of verifying each voter's registration could be a different story. As of Monday afternoon, the BOE had not confirmed it would include such a verification of the rolls in its recanvass, as requested by the Village of Port Jefferson at the behest of Erland.
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