JUDGE SETS NEW ELECTION FOR CLATSOP COUNTY DISTRICT 5 COMMISSIONER CONTEST

  

A judge on Monday accepted Clatsop County Clerk Maeve Grimes’ request to set aside the results of the May 20 election for the board of commissioners District 5 seat and set a new vote for Sept. 16.

Grimes formally contested the results of the contest between candidates Dale Barrett and Lianne Thompson after the discovery of a balloting error involving almost 500 county voters.

A total of 344 voters living in District 5 received mail-in ballots that did not contain the District 5 race. Another 147 voters living outside the district received ballots that erroneously included the District 5 contest – 27 of those voters cast ballots.

Unofficial results from the May 20 election gave Thompson 706 votes to 625 for Barrett.

Tillamook County Circuit Court Judge Jonathan Hill agreed that the number of erroneous ballots meant the election should be set aside and a new election held.

State law allows an election to be contested by a county clerk or other certain parties for a “nondeliberate or material error in the distribution of the official ballots by a local elections official.”

The special Sept. 16 election will involve all of District 5, which covers southern Clatsop County including Cannon Beach, Arch Cape, Jewell, Elsie, Hamlet and portions of Seaside. Ballots will be mailed out on Aug. 29.

The balloting error stems from the redrawing of the five commissioner districts’ boundaries in 2011 following the release of population data from the federal census. The new boundary placed part of Precinct 38 in Seaside within District 5 and the rest in District 2. Data that was subsequently entered for the county voter rolls mis-identified 491 voters in one or the other commissioner district.

The Clerk’s Office is working with the county’s Geographic Information Systems (GIS) specialist to square the county’s data with the state voter registration system and ensure all voters are assigned to the correct districts.