ELECTION RECAP: County sees 6% drop in turnout

More than 3,000 voters cast their ballot this primary election. Of those votes, more than 80% were for Republican candidates and the contested local races on that ballot.

But still fewer voters showed up to vote in this non-presidential primary election compared to the last primary election without a presidential race in 2018. In 2018, 31.02% of the county’s voters pulled a Democratic or Republican ballot. For last week’s primary election 24.69% of registered voters showed up to vote.

In 2018, there were 2,413 Republican ballots cast and 1,251 Democratic. For last week’s primary election, voters pulled 2,615 Republican ballots and 540 Democratic.

This primary election had less Democratic candidates on the ballot, meaning races such as the sheriff and clerk — where no Democratic candidates have filed to run — were determined by Republican voters. If no independent candidates file to run for these local offices this summer then Republicans have the opportunity sweep local office races with no Democratic candidates this fall.

Only two seats on the Brown County Council and the District 1 Brown County Commissioner seat will be up for grabs by Republican and Democrats candidates this fall.

With no contested races on the local Democratic ballot, Brown County Election Board President Mark Williams said he heard anecdotal reports of Democratic voters pulling a Republican ballot to vote in local contested races, but that he did not have hard data proving that happened.

If a voter is challenged by another voter for pulling a party ballot they are not a member of to influence an election they could sign an affidavit at their polling location stating they intend to vote for that same party in future elections. If that affidavit is signed then the voter would be allowed to pull that specific party’s ballot and vote.

Early, in-person voting started April 5 and residents could also request ballots to vote by mail ahead of the primary election on May 3. This primary election 828 votes were cast early and of those only 119 were Democratic ballots, which could mean some Democratic voters pulled a Republican ballot this election, Clerk Kathy Smith said.

Provisional ballots are also offered to voters if there’s some question about their eligibility to vote in that election or at the poll where they are trying to vote. Provisional ballots are not issued to any voter challenged for party affiliation, according to the state affidavit form.

Only 16 provisional ballots were given to voters this primary.

After each election, the county election board examines each provisional ballot individually — along with the reasons poll workers give for why they gave that voter a provisional ballot and not a regular ballot — and the board decides, according to the law, which provisional ballots should count and which cannot.

At the start of the primary election day May 3, Williams and fellow election board member Kevin Fleming were in the Salmon Room checking over the ballots that were mailed in or cast early alongside Absentee Voter Board members Julie Cauble and Deb Noe the morning of May 3.

The ballots were organized into stacks of 50 after members checked the signatures on each ballot to ensure they had been signed by an election board member or their proxy before given to a voter, as required by election law.

At the end of Election Day, no ballots were discovered that had not been signed by an election board member unlike the 2020 primary election when election board members found 123 ballots that had initials on them which were not in election board members’ handwriting. Those ballots were taken into the custody of law enforcement.

All ballots cast early were counted when polls closed at 6 p.m.

Noe and Cauble worked early voting ahead of the primary election. Noe said that the last three days of early, in-person voting had a steady stream of voters.

“There was someone in here all the time. It seemed like when someone was driving out, someone was driving in. But no one had to wait in line,” she said.

“Voters said it was easier to vote in-person early. A lot of people were going to be gone. But they do love coming in because it was 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. We are here on two Saturdays. It’s easier for people who have to work and cannot take off.”

The final totals for the Republican District 1 commissioners race — without provisional votes — were as follows: Diana Biddle with 845 votes; John Kennard with 551 votes and Ronald Sanders won the race with 1,064 votes.

Sanders will run against Democrat Stephanie Porter Kritzer this fall. Kritzer received 495 votes this primary election.

Brad Stogsdill won the Republican race for sheriff after receiving 1,486 votes. Republican Chad Williams received 870 votes and Scott Bowling received 226 votes in that race.

Smith lost her re-election bid to challenger Pearletta Banks after Banks received 1,337 votes to Smith’s 1,048.

A Democratic candidate did not file to run for clerk or sheriff.

Republican Michael Moore won the race primary race for coroner over Vivian Jo-Lynn Grimes. Moore received 1,618 votes and Grimes had 717.

Jim Kemp won the contested Republican race for the District 4 seat on the Brown County Council by receiving 349 votes. He will race against Democratic candidate Marcia Grooms Taylor this fall.

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At the polls

Southern Brown Volunteer Fire Department is the only polling location in Van Buren Township. By mid-afternoon on May 3, 195 ballots had been cast.

Van Buren Precinct Inspector Phil Kruger said the turnout was average for a primary election. He has worked between 10 and 20 elections. If this were a presidential election, there would be about 250 or 300 votes cast by noon at that precinct, he said.

The ratio between Republican and Democrat ballots was about 10:1, Kruger said.

Between 11:30 a.m. and noon, a problem arose for that precinct and three others when the ballot tabulating machines there began to reject ballots.

Two voters stepped up to the machine after filling out their ballots at the Van Buren precinct. When they tried to insert ballots into the machine, the screen said “Invalid ballot page.” Ballots were then “spat out” by the machine.

Rejected ballots were placed into an exterior box on the backside of the machine, which is a feature used in the event of a power outage that may keep the machine from accepting ballots.

Those ballots were entered into the machine once the issue was resolved.

Technicians were able to fix the issue by cleaning the surface of the machine that been covered in ink from felt tip pens that were being used by voters to mark their votes on the ballots. Once ballpoint pens were given to those precincts the machines quit rejecting ballots because the ink was no longer smearing on the glass protecting the machine’s reading device, Williams said last week.

Over at Sprunica Baptist Church, the turnout was “pretty low,” poll inspector Sharlene Jones-Wall said. That polling also had technical issues with the poll book at the beginning of the day, causing them to be 12 minutes late in opening the doors to the four voters waiting outside.

Poll Inspector Duane Parsons came back from vacation early to work the polls for the first time at Fruitdale Volunteer Fire Department where voters in precincts 1 and 2 of Jackson Township cast their ballots. That poll also experienced issues with the ballot tabulating machines rejecting ballots due to smeared ink on the reading device glass.

Cindy Golis was a Democratic judge at Fruitdale Volunteer Fire Department. She said even though there’s a monetary incentive for poll workers, to her it’s not about the money — she just likes to help.

The election board will meet on May 13 at 1 p.m. in the Salmon Room at the County Office Building to examine provisional ballots.