Hearings over elections end   (NJ)

Kirk Moore  TOMS RIVER BUREAU  Asbury Park Press  July 23, 2008

TOMS RIVER — Trial proceedings concluded this week in the lawsuit that Waretown activist Michele Rosen and former Barnegat candidate Rose Jackson brought against the Ocean County Board of Elections, and Superior Court Judge Edward Oles is expected to issue a written opinion within two weeks.

The plaintiffs' calling of witnesses ended Monday, when Rosen — who has been representing herself — questioned workers from the county Voting Technology Center in Toms River, where electronic voting machines are prepared, and where machines were rechecked in November 2006 after a software glitch transferred some U.S. Senate votes cast in Barnegat to a voting district in Lakewood. In their original complaint, Rosen and Jackson sought to have 2006 election results voided for Barnegat, Lavallette, Seaside Park, South Toms River and Tuckerton, and hold a special revote using paper ballots. But Judge Oles dismissed that part of the lawsuit, saying he would defer to a Mercer County court case challenging the statewide use of Sequoia election machines.

Since then, the Ocean County case has focused on the plaintiff's contention that the county Board of Elections has failed to follow state elections laws and has deprived voters of their voting rights under the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.

"We administer the election laws as we're instructed to by the state attorney general . . . until the Attorney General's Office tells us to do something in a different way, in which case, we will," said George R. Gilmore, who chairs the county Board of Elections and is also head of the county Republican party organization.

Machine manufacturer Sequoia Voting Systems never completely determined why the Barnegat votes were tallied as Lakewood ballots, other than there was some momentary glitch in the software that collected results from the county's 33 municipalities. But in their testimony on the witness stand, Gilmore and other witnesses said they are still confident in the system.

There was no effect on the outcome of the election. "They were the ones ed by the state. We aren't the only county that uses them," he said Tuesday.

Rosen said the trial showed "individuals can stand up and challenge the attorney general. . . . One person can actually do something."

Rosen said her next effort will be to ask state lawmakers to change the law on county boards of elections. "There is something wrong when political leaders can decide elections as members of the county Board of Elections."