Complications abound in Pike primary

Vote miscast; military vote doesn’t arrive; candidate won’t gamble to break tie, By David Hulse MILFORD — County officials are trying to sort out election complications to get Pike’s May 19 primary election certified by the June 3 deadline, Pike Commissioners’ Clerk Gary Orben said Wednesday. One US Navy Sailor held the balance for the last Republican Party ballot position for November’s election of Delaware Valley School District board members — but the sailor’s vote didn’t arrive in Milford in time to be counted. A Dingman Republican voter challenged the certification of the election, charging she had been given a Democratic Party card at the polls and mistakenly used it to vote. Each garnering 638 votes on May 19, incumbent Ed Silverstone and challenger Jack Fisher tied for that last spot. State law calls on the candidates to “cast lots” to decide a tie. However, Fisher says his born-again Christian ethics will not allow him to gamble and that he would withdraw instead. At Friday’s re-count canvass, four yet uncounted votes remained. Three were approved provisional ballots, two of which were from Delaware Valley School District precincts, but both were Democratic ballots and did not impact the tie. The single remaining ballot was a military ballot and it was a Republican Party ballot. Officials said Friday that the ballot was mailed to a sailor aboard ship at a military APO address and had not yet been returned. The law required that it must be returned before the end of business on May 26, but the date passed without its arrival. Sunrise Lake resident and Republican voter Linda G. Boyle attended the canvass and distributed a letter to the press, complaining of a computer programing problem that allowed her to vote in the Democratic Party’s primary and that school board candidate Bob Goldsack was involved in re-programing the computer, after receiving verbal instructions from his wife, county elections director, Yolanda Goldsack. Boyle sought a commissioners’ investigation and had hoped to delay the canvass, but in a handwritten post-script she stated that Orben had directed that the canvass must go on. Orben said Wednesday that the election has not been certified and that board of elections is investigating Boyle’s charges, but thus far has found that while several people erroneously received the wrong voting cards, only Boyle voted in the wrong primary. Regarding her charge about candidate Goldsack’s role at the polls, Orben said the board has found that no person, other than those authorized to, had touched the machines. With the tie and its prescribed resolution still in effect, Fisher stated Tuesday that he intended to withdraw rather than gamble for the board seat, but amended that on Wednesday saying he had since been told that he would not be allowed to withdraw. As we reported last week, the law allows candidates to appoint a proxy lot caster and states that “If any candidate or candidates receiving a tie vote, fail to appear before twelve o’clock noon of (the appointed lot casting day), the county board... shall cast lots for him or them.” Orben confirmed that Fisher’s lot would be cast with or without him on hand.