Peachland to find out its mayor on Monday
Judicial recount of ballots cast in town’s mayoral race set for Monday morning
Ajudicial recount of ballots cast in the Peachland mayoral race will be held Monday morning. Provincial court Judge Ellen Burdett will go through all ballots by hand. The unofficial count has produced a tie, with incumbent Cindy Fortin and challenger Harry Gough each with 804 votes. Three other candidates drew 734 votes collectively.
“We’re going to recount all of the ballots for mayor,” Burdett said. “I’ve been involved in these before, and they tend to take a day.”
If the judge’s count confirms a tie between Fortin and Gough, the winner’s name will be drawn out of a hat or a box, Burdett said. She asked Peachland election officials to make sure to bring a suitable container for the purpose, should the need to draw a name arise.
Accredited media can attend the judicial recount, which will start at 10 a.m. at the Peachland Community Centre, but they cannot report throughout the day how the ballot counting is going.
The judge’s announcement of the election winner, or the drawing of the name from a hat, can be filmed.
Burdett outlined how the recount will be conducted, with each ballot being examined to determine the voter’s intent. Although voters were instructed on election day to make a small pencil mark in an oval next to their preferred candidate’s name, there is more flexibility shown in a judicial recount.
“If I can discern the intention of the voter, I can count it as a regular ballot,” Burdett said. “But if it’s impossible to determine the voter’s intention, it is rejected.”
If there are ballots on which the voter’s intention seems unclear, representatives of both Gough and Fortin will be able to make recommendations to the judge on how it should be counted.
At the outset of Friday’s hearing at the Kelowna courthouse, Gough raised concerns about the way the Oct. 20 vote was conducted. He alleged the ballot boxes had not been properly sealed and stored after the polls closed.
“I’m opposed to the way some things were handled,” Gough said.
In response, Peachland’s chief election officer, Polly Palmer, told the judge all relevant election rules were properly followed.
Burdett told Gough he would have to raise any concerns about the integrity of the voting process through an application to the B.C. Supreme Court by Nov. 20. The only decision before her on Friday, Burdett said, was whether to grant the town’s request for a judicial recount.
Asked outside the courthouse if he would file such an application with the B.C. Supreme Court alleging election irregularities, Gough said he will wait for the outcome of Monday’s recount.
“I’ll certainly wait till the judicial count is done before I make a decision either way,” Gough said of a possible appeal to the Supreme Court.
On election night, Gough was declared the winner by one vote. But a ballot review on Monday produced an extra vote for Fortin.
Election staff have said an electronic tabulator failed, with a vote for Fortin going into the ballot box but not being recorded by the machine.
“I’m not saying a vote slipped in (at the Monday verification process),” Gough said. “I’m just saying the boxes, in my opinion, from what I saw, I never saw a seal on any box. So that comes into question.”
Fortin did not attend Friday’s hearing at the Kelowna courthouse. She did not respond to an email asking why she wasn’t at the hearing where Burdett granted the application for a judicial recount.