Fayette County Board of Elections
The battle has been ongoing for months and the Chairwoman of the local Democratic Party, Judy Craig — who also sits on the Board of Elections — stood her ground and kept to her beliefs. Meanwhile, the other democrat on the board — Myron Priest — is being called a traitor by some within his own party.
The Fayette County Board of Elections voted on Monday to eliminate a position inside the Fayette County Board of Elections that has always been held by a registered democrat. The office staff that runs the Board of Elections has been comprised of four workers, two registered democrats and two registered republicans for decades. The person who fills those roles have always been people recommended from their respective political party.
Presently, the staff is Beth Ann Snyder, a registered democrat who was chosen by her political party to fill the position, and Jamie Brooks and Jamie Teeters, both registered republicans, also recommended by their party to fill their positions.
Trina Walters was the other democrat who worked for the board but resigned earlier this year after taking a position at an incorporated company. This left an open position inside the office.
For months, the Board of Elections has debated on filling Walters’ position, but the decision had to be made by a majority vote from the board. Craig and Priest argued that the position needed to be filled by a democrat to allow balance within the office. The republicans on the board, Robin Beekman and David Bihl, allegedly argued that the position wasn’t needed.
On Monday, Craig made a motion at the board’s meeting to keep the position left empty by Walters open and to budget for the salary in the 2014 budget, and that the Democratic Party would recommend a person to be hired. The motion died for a lack of a second. Previously, Priest agreed with Craig but that changed on Monday.
A different motion was made by Beekman to pay the Director and Deputy Director $40,000 a year at 35 hours a week and pay a clerk hourly. No overtime or comp time would be given to the clerk as of January 1. Priest seconded the motion with Beekman and Bihl voting in favor of it. Craig voted against it.
Excuses made by some that the position was cut because of budget issues and not political reasons were proved invalid by Fayette County Commissioner Dan Dean, saying that the commissioners haven’t suggested cuts in the Board of Election’s budget.
“I think they were trying to provide the best service to the citizens of Fayette County for the least dollars but we haven’t received their budget,” Dean said. “As we get close an election, they might add a [temporary] fourth person to help out, if needed.”
Craig said that the eliminated position is very much needed and that she and a former Board of Elections employee assisted the three other office workers during the election because the workload was too heavy.
“Myself and Vivian Heidi went into the office to prove that it took four people to run the office,” Craig told Fayette Advocate. “Vivian worked three days and I volunteered on the other days. We documented the workload and presented it to the rest of the board proving the work was too much for three people, yet they voted against it.”
Some within the local democratic party said Priest is a traitor and shouldn’t have agreed to eliminate the position that allows the republicans to outnumber the democrats and essentially giving control of the office to one political party.
There is no state law put in place saying that there has to be a balanced number of political affiliations in the office but for decades it has always been balanced in Fayette County.
“I’m very disappointed in the vote,” Craig said. “Myron’s term is expiring on February 29 requiring reappointment by the Democratic Executive Committee. We will just have to see where the executive committee stands.”
Calls to Priest and the others weren’t returned.