Porter County election roles released
For anyone who’s confused about how the election is supposed to work in Porter County, the Board of Commissioners has answers.
Commissioners on Friday released a 19-page document, complete with flow charts, that delineates who is responsible for what and provides contact information for local officials where appropriate.
“The Election Process: Roles and Responsibilities” can be viewed or downloaded at w w w. p o r t e rc o.o rg / D o c u - mentCenter/View/5289.
The guide, said Commissioner Laura Blaney, D-South, has been in the works for the past few weeks. The November general election was rife with problems in the county, including late-opening polls, absentee ballots that were not delivered to precincts to be counted, and a three-day wait for results based on the count of almost 19,000 absentee ballots.
“We realized by going through that mess there are really very few people who understand how an election works in Porter County, and that made a bad situation worse,” she said.
Neither the public nor people within county government had a full grasp of the roles and responsibilities of the many players in the election, which included the county clerk, the election board and the voters registration office, among others, Blaney said.
Elected officials have pledged to improve the process going forward. Democrat Jessica Bailey takes over as clerk since Republican Karen Martin could not seek a third term under state statute.
In the wake of the election woes, commissioners and members of the council asked Martin, who made an unsuccessful bid for auditor, to resign but she refused.
“You can’t really fix something if you don’t know how it’s bro- ken,” Blaney said.
Commissioners also have been advised that the Indiana Secretary of State’s Election Division has launched an investigation of the election, in coordination with Indiana State Police and the Indiana State Board of Accounts.
Commissioners had asked for an investigation from that office shortly after the election, and also requested the FBI to consider an investigation. While the FBI did meet with county officials, there has been no update on whether they will proceed.
The board said in a statement that they will fully cooperate with the many facets of the investigation, “including providing complaints, emails and other correspondence received that pertain to the election, and urges all other officials to do the same.”
Commissioners said they will refrain from any further comments about the investigation while it is pending, unless specifically requested to do so by the Election Division.
State Sen. Karen Tallian, DPortage, and State Rep. Ed Soliday, R-Valparaiso, also requested the Secretary of State’s Office review the election processes in the county, according to a spokeswoman there.
“Once the review is complete, we will provide an update,” she said.
Amy Lavalley is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.