Orange County has posted the detailed schedule for the Carrboro special election on March 19, looks like 13 days of early voting in Hillsborough and none in Carrboro.
http://www.co.orange.nc.us/elect/includes/ElectionCalendar.asp
March 19th Special Election for Carrboro to fill an unexpired term ending 2015 for Board of Aldermen
February 1, Noon - Filing Begins - $10 filing fee
February 15, Noon - Filing Ends
February 22 - Registration Books Close for Special Election.
February 28 - March 16 - Early Voting for Special Election
Location
Orange County Bd of Elections
Days and Hours
Thursday & Friday, Feb. 28 & March 1, 9 am - 5 pm;
Mondays - Fridays, March 4 - March 15, 9 am - 5 pm
Saturday, March 16, 9 am - 1 pm.
March 12 - Deadline to request Absentee Ballots by mail. Ballots will be available as soon as possible after filing ends on February 22.
March 19 - Special Election Day for Carrboro Municipalities only. Polls are open 6:30 am - 7:30 pm
Issues:
Comments
Early voting only in Hillsborough
Evidently somebody in Carrboro decided it cost too much to have early voting in Carrboro.
early voting
Apparently it was an extra $7,000 to have early voting in Carrboro (by the way Carrboro precincts had from 19% to 27% of their total turnout vote on election day last November, the rest were early votes or mail-in)
Damon has great blog post on the three ways to vote for 3/19
http://damonseils.org/2013/01/28/three-ways-to-vote/great post by Damon on his campaign website on the "three ways to vote" for March 19
Carrboro candidate filing list
http://www.co.orange.nc.us/elect/includes/documents/CandidateFilingsforCarrboroSpecialElection.pdfopened noon today, closes noon Friday 2/15
95% thru the filing period, still just Damon
95% thru the filing period, still just Damon. Filing ends noon Fridayhttp://www.co.orange.nc.us/elect/includes/documents/CandidateFilingsforCarrboroSpecialElection.pdfSomeone asked me "what if there is only one candidate". In that case the ballot will have Damon's name and a space for a write-in. Most votes wins.
Updated: Just Damon
Looks like Carrboro will be playing out that "what if there is only one candidate" scenario.
write-in
I'm informed that I received one write-in vote in 2012 for soil and water conservation supervisor in Orange County.
Congrats, Damon
Barring a miracle the likes of which I've never seen, Damon will be joining the Carrboro Board of Aldermen next month!Now, dear reader... don't you want to take his place as a member of the OP Posse? Look what great success it can bring you! ;-)
Congrats Damon
Looking forward to working with you. Very exciting.
6 early voting days, 1 vote
I know Fred's not here anymore, but can we say this is truly silly season? :)http://www.co.orange.nc.us/elect/includes/documents/2013CarrboroSpecialE...
1 vote
My opinion. If early voting took place in Carrboro instead of Hillsborough you might see a few more votes. Folks walking by town hall might stop in and take advantage of the convience. Schelping to Hillsborough to vote in an election where there is only one candidate is not on peoples radar. I am assuming this is one of those topics that will come to the Aldermen as a petition for change in the near future.
Carrboro Special Election Voter Demographics
Trying to gauge the local mood? I can say with high confidence that the Carrboro electorate:
voter surge at BoE office Wednesday
A surge of two Carrboro voters in Hillsborough Wednesday has tripled the total number of votes to three http://www.co.orange.nc.us/elect/includes/documents/2013CarrboroSpecialElectionOne-stopTotals.pdf
Hopefully,
they weren't observed flipping a coin.
Voting has continued at a
Voting has continued at a torrid pace — the total number of votes cast increased by 33% on Friday. The people are speaking!
final early vote total 4
final early vote total 4. Remind me again who thought of this?
Something dysfunctional about this election
The fact that this election is being held when the outcome is guaranteed is troubling. Common sense easily recommends canceling the election and saving taxpayer money. The fact that this is not happening highlights the dysfunctional nature of a system that requires an act of the State Legislature to do something so simple & straight-forward. The lack of home rule powers in North Carolina are once again a hindrance to simple common sense.
History
While it does seem silly to have an election for a single candidate, I'd like to remind everyone WHY the BOA chose to institute the special elections provision. In 2005, Mark Chilton and Alex Zaffron, both of whom were aldermen at the time, chose to run for mayor when Mike Nelson decided not to run. When Mark won the mayor's seat, his alderman seat was left vacant. At the time, the seat had to be filled through an application process.The alderman had to choose between filling that seat with one of the recent candidates or someone who had never run for elected office in Carrboro and had been an active campaigner for one of the winning candidates. The slate of alderman candidates that year had been highly qualified and equally contentious. Several applied for the empty seat. I don't know for sure, but I suspect the appointment process was as uncomfortable for the aldermen as it was for the citizenry. They chose to appoint Dan Coleman, but also chose to amend their process so that similar situations in the future would be decided through a special election.It's unfortunate that the first application of the new policy yielded a single candidate which makes the expense look like a waste of limited financial resources. But for those of you who were here in 2005 and who were critical of the appointment process, wouldn't you prefer that in a similar situation the decision was made through a democratic election, regardless of the cost? Is $18,000 really the price of democracy?
Why does it ....
have to be either/or? Why can't a law be written that the vacancy is to be filled by appointment by the BOA unless there is more than one applicant and, in that situation, a special election is to be held.
it will
George, Senate Bill 128 that just passed the Senate by unanimous voice vote does more or less what you are asking -- they can choose which mode of filling vacancy http://ncleg.net/gascripts/BillLookUp/BillLookUp.pl?Session=2013&BillID=s128&submitButton=Go House action probably soon
useful election - yes
Whether or not you believe in a special election or an appointment process, spending money on an election that accomplishes nothing (except wasting time & money) is absurd.