A necessary focus on Lake County
The issue: Absentee ballots
NWI Times
Aug 28, 2003
nwitimes.com/news/opinion/editorial/a-necessary-focus-on-lake-county/article_2dd455fc-5872-5283-9b56-d2b5087aa89e.html
Our opinion: This spotlight on the tainted voting process in Lake County should lead to legislative changes to stop these blatant abuses. It also should lead to punishment for those found guilty.
The Lake County election board did the right thing by deciding to study "apparent abuse of the (absentee ballot) process and system."
It's about time. It's not as if there haven't been problems and allegations of wrongdoing in previous elections. Of course, this time the election board really had no choice. Two high-profile cases in which challengers took their cases to court made this issue impossible to ignore.
In the recount case involving the East Chicago mayoral race, Mayor Robert Pastrick was declared the primary winner over George Pabey. But Special Lake Superior Court Judge Steven King chronicled hundreds of abuses in that city's election, naming voters who perjured themselves by falsely indicating on absentee ballot applications they would be absent from the county on Election Day.
In the recount challenge in the Schererville town judge race between incumbent Judge Deborah Riga and challenger Kenneth Anderson, a decision is expected next week. Allegations in that recount revolve around Schererville Democratic Precinct Committeeman Bob "Bosko" Grkinich, who handled a number of questionable absentee ballots. He took the Fifth Amendment rather than answer questions that might incriminate him.
The election board decided to form this committee at the same time it accepted the resignation of its chief mechanic, who admitted in his resignation letter that he voted in East Chicago although he was the process of moving his family to Schererville.
Justin Murphy, election board proxy member, urged the committee to investigate and take the lead in developing new policy.
Too late to take the lead, folks. That's something that should have been done a long time ago. Besides, a special Lake County grand jury has begun investigating the absentee ballot scandal.
At least the election board named to the committee state Rep. Chet Dobis, D-Merrillville, a leader of the Northwest Indiana delegation with some clout at the Statehouse. Dobis recently lambasted the "blatant vote fraud" in county elections.
This spotlight on the tainted voting process in Lake County should lead to legislative changes to stop these blatant abuses. It also should lead to punishment for those found guilty
Maybe then people will stop joking and bragging about the way things are done in Lake County and get on with the serious business of running clean elections.
No comments:
Post a Comment