NORWICH – Get ready for elections overload.
It’s getting late to combine the primary for New York State Legislature with the newly-scheduled Congressional primary on June 26, something local-level elections officials had hoped might happen. They of course now know it’s not going to be lumped together with the presidential primary coming up on April 24, when the state’s Republicans will have to choose among Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul to run against President Barack Obama in November.
So, as far as Chenango County Republican Commissioner Harriet Jenkins is concerned, a fourth election for New York’s legislative candidates will have to take place sometime in September.
“It hasn’t been set in stone yet. We still haven’t heard ... but I’m betting it’s going to be in September,” Jenkins said Monday.”We didn’t want four elections. We really didn’t budget for that.”
Democratic Commissioner Carol Franklin said all of the state’s county-level election boards have spoken to their local legislators and tried to have the primaries combined, but to no avail.
“No county budgeted for three primaries, and it’s going to be a lot more costly as a result. People are going to have to go out with petitions again; it’s going to be overkill on voting,” she said.
The Chenango County Board of Elections budgeted for three elections this year: two primaries and the gubernatorial in November. Instead, elections commissioners estimate an additional $30,000 will be spent on a third primary.
The last general election in Chenango County cost taxpayers $50,856 minus staff salaries.
Some media reports have estimated that the fourth election will cost New York State millions of dollars. New York Senator Tom Libous, R-Binghamton, said yesterday that he couldn’t confirm the exact amount, but said the U.S. District Court in Syracuse ordered the June 26 Congressional primary unexpectedly.
“Why they did that didn’t make a lot of sense, but it expedited everything with the redistricting. We weren’t happy with it because the normal primary date is in September for Congressional seats,” he said.
Fortunately, a streamlining effort at Chenango County’s polls has saved the county some elections’ expenses. Towns that had three districts, for example, now have two, and those that had two are now down to one.
The move ultimately saved the county thousands of dollars on inspectors and printing, Jenkins said. Town of Norwich Supervisor David C. Law, whose town went from three to two districts, said the move has eliminated the need to hire three on site monitors.
Many poll locations in the county were consolidated over the past two years. Cutting back on the number of districts last year will not inconvenience voters, who will go to the same locations as before. Both downsizing efforts were a perk of the new handicapped accessible machines that were mandated a decade ago with Washington’s Help America Vote Act.
The following towns now have one voting district: Afton, Bainbridge, New Berlin, North Norwich and Smithville. The towns of Oxford, Sherburne and Norwich went from three districts down to two, and the towns of Greene went from four to two.