Knauss, Leaders, Williams win in GOP supervisors primary
TIM ROHWER, Staff Writer
The Daily Nonpareil. 06/08/2006

Pottawattamie County Board of Supervisors Chairman Loren Knauss and fellow incumbent Lynn Leaders were the two top Republican Party winners in Tuesday's primary election for the board.

They will move on to November's general election, along with first-time candidate Roger Williams, who finished third in a 10-candidate field.

The three Republicans will face Democrats Dean Fischer, Debra West and Rex Grote for three open seats on the board.

The results became official after Wednesday's hand recount of ballots for a primary election marred by errors in counting by new machines purchased to prevent such errors.

Meanwhile, the cause of Tuesday's computer counting errors has been determined, said county deputy auditor Gary Herman.

According to Herman, the names of those in multiple candidate races are rotated in each precinct, so that one candidate won't be at the top of the list in all precincts. For example, one candidate's name might be at the top of the list in one precinct, but in the middle or at the bottom of the list in another precinct to avoid voter fraud, Herman said. The computers that read the ballots after they were completed were not programmed to recognize the different order for precincts, he said.

"They always alternate the listings to prevent voter fraud, but the computer didn't read it correctly," Knauss said. "I'm assuming it kept everything in alphabetical order."

Because of the programming error, some surprising numbers were tabulated in Tuesday's election before County Auditor Marilyn Jo Drake ordered a quick hand recount of absentee ballots that showed big differences. A hand recount of all the ballots was then held Wednesday.

A surprising story during Tuesday's computerized counting was the poor showing by Knauss, who was flirting with last place among the large field of GOP candidates for the county board.

But, the hand recount told the real story.

Knauss led the 10-candidate field with 1,398 votes, or 20.5 percent of the total. Leaders was second with 901 votes, or 13 percent of the total. Williams, whose father, Bob, was a longtime member of the board, finished third with 876 votes, or 12.9 percent of the total.

Since all three received more than 11.6 percent of the total, there will be no need for a party convention to nominate candidates for the general election. Under Iowa law, if multiple candidates seek multiple open seats - in this case, three - a nominating convention is not needed if the top winners receive 35 percent of the total vote divided by the number of seats to be filled - three in this instance or 11.6 percent.

All three of the Democratic board candidates were already assured of moving on to the November election. Fischer led the tight race with 950 votes, 34 percent of the total; He was followed by West with 921 votes, 33 percent of the votes; and Grote with 897 votes, 32 percent of the total.

In the Republican Pottawattamie County Recorder's race, which triggered Drake's hunch that something was amiss in Tuesday's computer count, incumbent and longtime recorder John Sciortino easily defeated newcomer Oscar Duran, 2,061 votes, or 85 percent of the total, to 347 votes, or 14 percent of the total. Sciortino was leading by only a couple of votes as Tuesday's computerized counting was nearing completion.

In the Democratic race for the 5th Congressional District seat, Joyce Schulte defeated Robert Chambers by an 883 to 491-vote margin.

In the Democratic race for governor, Iowa Secretary of State Chet Culver defeated Mike Blouin by a 702 to 585-vote margin. Blouin is the former director of the Iowa Department of Economic Development. Iowa Rep. Ed Fallon received 148 votes, or 10 percent of the total, while Sioux City engineer Sal Mohamed had 60 votes, or 4 percent of the total.

"What an incredible roller coaster ride," Knauss said of his showing in the county board race. "We went home Tuesday night in ninth place and came back in first. When I first saw those numbers Tuesday night, I was disappointed, but I just assumed we had 10 good candidates."

According to Tuesday's computer count of absentee votes, Knauss had only 34 votes, he said. A quick hand recount of those ballots, however, showed he actually had 98 votes.

He praised Drake and her staff for catching the errors early and ordering a hand recount for accuracy.

"If this election would have been turned in without the recount, the results would not have been accurate," Knauss said.

Knauss admitted he did not expect his dominating victory, but added, "It's a clear message that the projects that I have started and completed and will complete in the future are what the voters want. I'm doing what they want me to do. I want to thank all my supporters and everybody."