- November 17, 2024
-
-
Loading
Loading
Even as the county’s Canvassing Board certified the general elections in a Friday-afternoon meeting, a challenge to one of the races was presented: Palm Coast resident Carol Mikola has filed paperwork with the Department of State challenging the election of School Board member-elect Janet McDonald.
Mikola attended the Nov. 14 Canvassing Board meeting as an audience member, and used the public comment section to ask the board members to not certify McDonald’s election.
“There’s a question about this person’s eligibility to hold office,” Mikola said. “And, I think that — I’m saying this respectfully — that the Canvassing Board has the responsibility to the voters to ensure not just that the mechanics of the election were correct.”
But the Canvassing Board can not withhold the certification of an individual race. The board certifies all races at the same time, and it is their certification that starts the clock for the 10-day time frame in which citizens can file suit to challenge an individual race.
“We are required to certify the results before any lawsuit could be filed,” Canvassing Board Chairwoman and County Judge Melissa Moore Stens said to Mikola during the meeting. “If we withhold the results, it’s not just the results of that election; it would be the results of every election that occurred in Flagler County.”
Instead, on the advice of County Attorney and Canvassing Board Attorney Al Hadeed, the board noted in paperwork to be submitted to the state that it had received the challenge but declined to adjudicate.
Mikola’s complaint was two-fold: that McDonald was not qualified to run because she was not a lawfully registered voter, and that she is not qualified to hold office, for the same reason. Mikola had filed a similar complaint againt Janet McDonald's husband Dennis McDonald, who ran for a County Commission seat.
It’s too late for Mikola to press the first claim against Janet McDonald, Hadeed said, but she could go forward with the second.
“The circuit court does have jurisdiction, provided that the procedures of the statute are followed, it has jurisdiction to hear and decide the question of whether she is eligible to hold the office based on the constitutional requirement that she would need to be a registered voter at the present time today,” Hadeed said.
Mikola said the Department of State has forwarded her election fraud complaint against Janet McDonald to the State Attorney’s Office for investigation.
“Inaccurate”
As the board completed final paperwork to be sent off to the state about the election, another issue arose: Elections Supervisor Kimberle Weeks had typed, on one of the reports, that Canvassing Board members had been removed.
County Commissioner and Canvassing Board member Barbara Revels objected, writing on the document that she refused to sign it, and then signing next to her statement.
One Canvassing Board member — County Commission Chairman George Hanns — was voted off the board late on election night. Another, County Commissioner Charlie Ericksen, Hanns’ former Canvassing Board alternate, had earlier resigned voluntarily after Weeks said a $50 contribution in his name to County Commissioner Frank Meeker’s re-election campaign could be interpreted as a conflict of interest. The donation did not violate the law.
But the document in which Weeks had typed a line about Canvassing Board members being removed “was speaking to poll workers, voters, equipment, results, tabulations, transmissions, printing — those were all the things it asked about,” Revels said to reporters after the meeting. Weeks had written the line about Canvassing Board members being removed in a section labeled “other,” Revels said.
During the meeting, Weeks pressured Revels about her refusal to sign, saying the state might find the document incomplete without her signature.
“And I’d be happy to discuss that with them if they think that,” Revels replied.
“If it’s not in on a time-sensitive date or considered incomplete, then it could jeopardize being in violation,” Weeks said, “and I’m not willing to accept that violation.”
“Well, I’m not willing to accept your statement,” Revels said.
“I accept no responsibility if the state should find this incomplete and find us to be in violation,” Weeks said.
“I have a responsibility to sign something that I consider is accurate and appropriate. And I don’t think that’s accurate,” Revels said.
“This is most definitely accurate — a removal of a canvassing board member and a resignation of one canvassing board member alternate,” Weeks said.
“Kim, I’m not going to argue with you. Do what you want,” Revels sad.
The document the two were arguing over was not the one required for the election to be certified.
Break room squabbles
Palm Coast City Councilman Bill McGuire addressed Weeks during the meeting’s public comment period, responding to Weeks’ complaints at previous meetings and statements to the press that election workers have been treated rudely by city staff at the Palm Coast Community Center.
“I stood before this board in October, and pledged that I would go down there numerous times a day,” McGuire said. “I did go down there three or four time a day, and I asked the poll workers if there were any problems, and I got a lot of smiling faces and thumbs up.”
One poll worker wrote in a complaint to Weeks that on Election Day he’d asked if there was a microwave he could use to heat his food, and was told there wasn’t one, when he could see it in the next room over. The man also approached McGuire several hours after the incident.
Weeks read the poll worker’s letter about the microwave incident at the Nov. 6 meeting.
McGuire said during the Nov. 14 meeting that the microwave was a small microwave in an enclosed office, and that it was used for Parks and Recreation staff and not available for public use. But, he said, “We’ll do everything we can to make the people who work at the polls feel comfortable and feel that the city stands there to assist in any way possible.”
Weeks responded by asking him who paid for the microwave.
“Kimberle, that’s been there a long, long time, nobody knows where it came from but it’s only used — it’s a little-bitty, cheap K-Mart-type thing — and they’re the only ones that use it. We don’t let anybody from the general public use that microwave," McGuire replied.
He said he would have brought in his own microwave if it would have “made things more harmonious.”
“The point I’m trying to make here is the city of Palm Coast is not trying to work against you," he said. "We will do everything we can to make your worker feel as if they’re in a good working place. And the feedback I got from them was all positive."
Revels suggested that Weeks train poll workers to bring cold food on Election Day, since they are not permitted to leave the polling location.
“Our poll workers are properly trained in that fashion,” Weeks said. “They’re told to pack their lunches picnic-style because we cannot guarantee if there’s microwaves, coffee-makers, refrigerators … We do train them for that.”
The Canvassing Board canvassed two overseas ballots during the Nov. 14 meeting, which began at 4:30 p.m. and adjourned at 5:35 p.m. A court reporter hired by Weeks transcribed the meeting, and County Executive Administrative Assistant Christie Mayer took minutes. No state observers were present.
To view a copy of a letter Mikola submitted to the Canvassing Board about her complaint against Janet McDonald, click here. To view her elections fraud complaint on Janet McDonald, click here. To view a letter from the State Department informing Mikola that the case had been forwarded to the State Attorney's Office, click here.
