Parties should bear portion of primary cost, registrar says
 
By SUZANNE TATE, Coalfield Progress Managing Editor June 23, 2005 
 
On the heels of a doubly busy primary election day, Wise County Registrar Tom Chester estimates it cost Wise County about $10,000 to process the votes of only 743 people.  
That includes programming voting machines, moving the machines, printing ballots and paying about 70 poll workers to cover 12 precincts, Chester said Wednesday.

Localities are required by law to hold a primary election if political parties request one, Chester explained. That was the case in the June 14 primary for statewide races for governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general.

Chester said it has become more common in statewide races for political parties to request primary elections by locality, with the locality bearing the cost.

"I wish the (state) code would change and make the parties responsible for a portion of the cost," Chester said. "Since they can pass it (the cost) on to the locality they don't think about it as much."

Had it been a single party primary, only 35 or 40 election officials would have been needed, Chester noted. But since both Democrats and Republicans called for primaries, about 70 election officials were used.

They looked up the name of each person coming to vote, marked them off in the election book, gave the voter an entry slip and determined in which party primary the voter intended to vote, Chester explained.

Election workers are paid a flat fee of $110, plus $10 for attending a training session, he said. Chiefs are paid $10 extra for picking up boxes of election materials and $10 extra for returning them, he said. They also are paid mileage.

In cases where a candidate has no competition, that candidate's name does not appear on the ballot. This was true for Tim Kaine, who was the only Democratic candidate for governor. People voting in the democratic primary for governor did not choose "Kaine" because he was the only option, Chester noted.

In the Democratic primary, lieutenant governor was the only contested race and the only one that bore names on the ballot.

Across the state and locally, some candidates are still nominated in party conventions. In the First District House of Delegates race, for example, Scott County Democrat Rex McCarty was nominated by convention and will face incumbent Terry Kilgore. Linda Tiller, a Russell County Republican, was nominated by convention to challenge incumbent Del. Clarence "Bud" Phillips in the Second District House of Delegates race. Phillips also was nominated by convention in May.

DOUBLE WHAMMY DAY

Chester's office was particularly busy on June 14.

"It was a double whammy day for us," Chester said.

It also was the deadline for candidates for Wise County School Board and the county board of supervisors to return candidate packets and signed petitions for the November election.

So along with verifying primary election results for statewide office, Chester and his staff were counting and verifying signatures on petitions for local elections and helping candidates with forms and paperwork.

"We were operating on two tracks," he said. "Here we were doing primary voting for statewide elections and accepting materials back from board of supervisors and school board candidates. There was a ton of paperwork being kept up with. Both had the same deadline of 7 p.m. on the primary date. It was a lot to handle."