Date for recount of Peachland vote to be set today
An application for a judicial recount of the Peachland mayoral vote will be held today at the Kelowna courthouse.
At the hearing, a time and date for the recount is expected to be set.
It will also be determined whether all mayoral ballots will be recounted or just the ballots for Cindy Fortin and Harry Gough, who ended up tied after Saturday’s election.
Mayoral candidates, their official agents and legal counsel for the candidates are entitled to be present at the 11:30 a.m. public hearing.
Gough and Fortin tied with 804 each after Saturday’s election.
After the completion of the judicial recount, if the vote is still tied, the results will be determined by a draw.
The court will oversee this process, directing a person who is not the candidate or a candidate representative to draw the name of the person who will be declared mayor of Peachland.
The judicial recount must be completed by Nov. 2.
On election night, a preliminary count gave Gough 804 votes and Fortin 803.
But a verification process on Monday confirmed a problem with one of the voting machines. After one ballot was put into the machine for automatic tabulation, the device jammed, according to Peachland’s chief election officer, Polly Palmer.
The vote for Fortin wasn’t counted on election night but was added to the totals on Monday.