RECOUNT HEARING SET

Challenge To Voided O’Connor Tie-Vote Expected

 (Reprinted from Amboy Beacon, Nov. 17, 2010) SOUTH AMBOY — A hearing on Independent candidate for Mayor Mary O’Connor’s request for a recount of the Nov. 2 city election’s votes in her contest with Democratic City Council President Fred Henry and two others is scheduled to be conducted this morning before Superior Court Judge Philip Paley, sitting in New Brunswick.

Henry was declared the winner of a four-way race for Mayor after an earlier counting of 12 of the city’s 21 provisional election-ballots by the Middlesex County Board of Elections at its New Brunswick headquarters, putting him over the top with one vote more than O’Connor.

But one of nine uncounted provisional ballots, cast by a woman who voted for O’Connor but which was not examined by the Board, was discovered by the Independent’s researchers before she filed her request for a recount late last week, thereby reopening the question of the counting of votes in the election of a successor to Mayor John O’Leary, who decided in March not to seek an unprecedented seventh four-year term as Chief Executive of the “Pleasant Little City.”

O’Connor was joined by former Assemblywoman Arline Friscia, former Councilwoman Beverly Samuelson, Lori Papernik and attorney Sean Connelly. Henry, who left early, was accompanied by O’Leary, his brother, Housing Authority Executive Director Thomas O’Leary, and attorney Michael Baker.

If the disputed ballot had been counted, there would have been a tie between O’Connor and Henry with 1,128 votes each, thereby forcing a special election on Tuesday, Jan. 18, with the city’s voters asked to choose between the two tied candidates.

That ballot, which was among eight ballots disqualified by the staff, was voided because no records were found to show that the voter had registered in-time to vote on Nov. 2.

Also, a Mail-In Ballot (MIB), formerly known as an “absentee vote,” which was found in the Board’s office one week after the election, was rejected unanimously by the four-member Board in an emergency meeting held last Friday because the voter did not comply with proper procedure.

According to Administrator James Vokral, that ballot was “put in the wrong pile” because the outer envelope in which it was supposed-to be mailed was not used, replaced with a regular brown envelope.

The voter placed his MIB inside the proper inner envelope, but failed to attach his signed certificate to the inner envelope.

“This ballot would have been voided even if it had been put in the proper pile,” Vokral said.

O’Connor’s request, if it is approved by Paley, would encompass a review of the tapes from the voting-machines, including any discrepancies between the number of Authorities To Vote (ATVs) and the number of recorded votes, and a recount of both the MIBs and the provisional ballots.

“Any comments that I make about individual ballots will be made directly to the Judge,” O’Connor said in a prepared statement issued after her researchers completed their examination of the paper ballots.“This election is not over. A recount is being requested.”

Henry said that he was “happy with the way things have gone to this point.”.

With 2,568 votes cast, the unofficial balloting ended with Henry receiving

1,075 votes on the machines based in various public buildings throughout the one-square-mile municipality, following a contentious campaign which was branded by many observers as the city’s “dirtiest,” to 1,061 for O’Connor, who lost to O’Leary in 2006 by about 200 votes — a 14-vote lead for the 18-year incumbent Councilman. Two other Independents for Mayor, Vincent Mackiel with 192 and John Dragotta with 93, trailed.

The counting of mail-in ballots increased Henry’s unofficial vote-total to

1,106 to 1,098 for O’Connor on Election Night — a spread of just eight.

That difference was shaved to just three the following day, when a bag containing more mail-in ballots was discovered in the First Ward and immediately

transported to New Brunswick.

That set the stage for the counting of 13 of the 21 provisional ballots, overseen by Vokral, after eight ballots were voided by the staff after meticulous research of voting records.

At that time, O’Connor was accompanied by Samuelson, Papernik and Connelly, while Henry was accompanied by Councilman-elect Michael “Mickey” Gross, Thomas O’Leary and Baker. The provisional ballots, still sealed in special bags, were split between the two groups, seated at a distance from each-other, who proceeded to examine the names-and-addresses for about two hours.

During the next stage of the counting, the Board — two Democrats and two Republicans — convened at 4 p.m. to go-over eight ballots which were challenged by O’Connor. Henry did not challenge any of the provisional ballots.

The Board voted unanimously to accept seven of the challenged ballots and to reject one of them. Those seven went back into the mix with the five unchallenged ballots, and were pumped-through a counting machine, after the rest of the county’s provisionals.

After the South Amboy results were read aloud by County Clerk Elaine Flynn, Henry was hugged by Gross and O’Leary, and the three men left quickly.

On Election Night, the 2010 campaign for two at-large Council seats and one Ward Council seat resulted in the Democratic Council nominees easily defeating their opponents, newcomer Gross leading with 1,135 unofficial votes, followed by incumbent Councilman Joseph Connors with 1,014, Republican nominee Saverio Sagliocco with 982, Independent Eugene “Gene” Reagan with 751 and GOP nominee David Longenhagen with 680. Recently-appointed First Ward Councilman Donald Applegate, running unopposed, received 463 unofficial votes.

In addition to the usual rash of reports of campaign-signs being torn-down or put-up without authorization, this year’s local contest saw the resurrection on a weekly basis of a bimonthly community newspaper which was defunct for about 10 years, now unabashedly promoting the Democratic ticket; the anonymous distribution of one flier depicting an O’Connor supporter in a Nazi uniform, and another flier attacking O’Connor as a “terrorist,” and the mysterious “endorsement” of Mackiel’s candidacy by a non-existent “South Amboy Tea Party.”

During Election Day itself, numerous complaints reportedly were made to the Police Department, the Board of Elections and the state Attornet General’s Office, which is believed to have sent an observer to the city to monitor the voting.

One Council candidate was accused of “electioneering” at the Senior Resour ce Center, S. Stevens Avenue, and was asked to leave; a photographer from an out-of-county daily newspaper allegedly took random photos at a polling-place and was escorted out, and eggs were said to have been thrown at an O’Connor supporter’s car by Henry supporters, leading to a heated confrontation involving the driver’s brother which police officers broke-up. There were unconfirmed reports that off-duty police were called-out by Police Chief Darren LaVigne to maintain order.

The local race followed back-to-back municipal tax-increases of 38 percent last year and 12 percent this year, plus an increase of over five percent in school taxes approved in-between by the incumbent Council.

Apparently with much reluctance, Council members voted to adopt an Amendment to the Calendar Year 2010 Budget and the Budget itself without including $800,000 as anticipated revenue, after the state Department of Community Affairs (DCA) “would not allow us to put that money in our Budget for this year as anticipated revenue,” Henry explained after the vote.

That Amendment to the CY 2010 Budget is expected to increase local taxes by another $722,576, on top of the $39 hike previously-announced by the Adminis tration and the Council on a home assessed at $266,000, the average in South Amboy, from the unamended spending plan. Using the numbers provided with the CY 2010 Budget as introduced, the amended Budget is expected to increase the municipal portion of taxes on the average home by $268.

During the campaign, the challengers criticized the tax-hikes, pledging to be more-frugal than the incumbents with spending and to encourage more commercial tax-ratables to relocate to South Amboy to replace revenues now nee ded to be drawn from taxing residential properties.