Three election recounts to take place

LISBON -- The Columbiana County Board of Elections proved once again that every vote counts after having to pick a name from a jar to break the tie between Elton Lowmiller and Martin Merrick for West Township trustee, with Lowmiller called the lucky winner.

"We made history," Lowmiller quipped as he and Merrick sat side by side for the drawing.

After the official results of the Nov. 4 general election were determined, the two men each had 299 votes for the second of two seats. Glenn Whiteleather was the top vote-getter with 306 votes. Incumbent Trustee Todd Wright had 274 votes and Tiffany Tomer-Horton had 98 votes.

Board of Elections Board Chairman David Johnson said in his 35 years on the board, he can only recall members having to break a tie just a few times. He said the board would have to determine the outcome by lot as called for by Ohio law. They could have done a coin toss, too, but chose the lot drawing for the tiebreaker.

Each name was placed on a separate piece of paper and shown to both candidates before being placed in the jar and shaken up by board member Greg Smith, then Johnson picked one without looking and announced Elton Lowmiller as the winner, shaking hands with both men and presenting them each with their piece of paper.

He noted that Elton will be the third generation of his family to serve as West Township trustee, with the term for Dale ending Dec. 31.

Board of Elections Director Kim Fusco said there were a lot of close races.

"So anybody who says 'my vote doesn't count,' there's a lot of races where one vote makes a difference," Johnson said.

The board certified the official tally of votes from the general election and ordered three recounts based on the margin in those particular races being less than one-half of 1 percent. Besides an automatic recount for the West Township race, there will be recounts for the Fairfield Township trustee race and the United Local school board race.

The recounts, which require at least 5% of the vote for each race to be tallied by hand, will be conducted starting at 9 a.m. Monday. The candidates and the public can attend. The results of the recounts will be certified during a meeting of the board scheduled for 8 a.m. Dec. 2 at board offices in Lisbon.

The board determined by a random drawing which precincts for each race have to be counted by hand, writing the precincts on pieces of paper and then drawing them out until they had enough to reach 5% for each race.

For West Township, 742 ballots were cast in the two precincts, with the 5% needed totaling 37 ballots. West Township Bayard precinct was selected and includes 240 ballots to be counted by hand.

In Fairfield Township, where there were five candidates for two trustee seats, the vote totals were: incumbent Bob Hum with 844 votes, David Vollnogle with 835 votes, Logan Cope and Jared Work with 821 votes each and Carly Brock with 369 votes. No tiebreaker was needed for Cope and Work since they weren't in the top two, but the difference between them and Vollnogle is close enough to warrant a recount.

Fairfield Township includes nine precincts and 2,505 ballots were cast, requiring a recount of at least 125 ballots by hand. Columbiana East with 256 ballots was selected for the recount.

For the United Local school district, there are 12 precincts with 3,289 ballots cast this election. The 5% percent comes to 164 ballots that have to be counted by hand. The first precinct selected was Center Township South with 137 ballots, so a second precinct had to be picked to reach the total needed. Butler Township North was selected with 365 ballots.

For the recount, Fusco explained that once the selected ballots are counted by hand, all the ballots for the precinct will be run through the machine and in most cases, the numbers all match up. The counting will be done in bipartisan teams of two, one Democrat and one Republican.

There were some races for Perry Township trustee, Salineville village council and Lisbon village council were close, but not close enough for an automatic recount.

In other business, besides certifying the official results, the board certified the results of the overlapping counties, which include Mahoning, Carroll and Jefferson.

The board agreed to have the office at Dickey Drive, Lisbon closed Friday along with Thursday due to the Thanksgiving holiday. They also agreed to close the office on Dec. 24, along with Christmas Day on Dec. 25, and also said they plan to close on Dec. 26. Johnson said the employees deserve the break considering the long hours they worked before, during and after the election.