NORTH, S.C. – The North Election Commission unanimously upheld Tuesday’s municipal election results following a hearing Friday afternoon to hear a challenge from unsuccessful town council incumbent Rose Binyard.

Binyard placed third in the race for two council seats. Winning those seats were Julius P. Jones with 92 votes and Jeff Washington with 86 votes.

Binyard received 82 votes, and candidate Lee Scarborough Hughes had 77 votes.

Binyard claimed that poll worker Edna Riley had told numerous voters they had to vote for two candidates when the voters actually had the option of voting for just one person.

Changing even a few votes could have a major effect in a town with as small a voting population as North, Hughes said. Hughes said she herself was told she had to vote for two candidates. She said she wanted to vote for just one candidate but was afraid if she did, the computer would kick her vote out.

Following the election, Hughes said she talked with numerous residents who claimed they had also been told they had to vote for two candidates. She did not ask those residents to attend the hearing but was in possession of 12 sworn affidavits from them. Election Commission officials, however, told Hughes the affidavits were inadmissible.

Hughes also produced one witness, Thurmond Williams.

“I was told you had to vote for two – not one, two,” Williams said. “That’s what I was told.”

Binyard, who said she had three witnesses who were unable to attend the hearing, called Riley as her witness. But Riley denied telling anyone they had to vote for two candidates.

“I told the people they can – I didn’t say they had to. Can vote; can and had is two different things,” Riley said.

North Election Commissioner Danny Fogle said the decision to uphold the Nov. 3 election results was based on town Ordinance 5-15-130.

“Speaking for the committee, we found that in order to put this election in doubt, we would have had to have found at least four votes that were affected by the allegation,” Fogle said.

“But because of a lack of direct testimony and that the affidavits were inadmissible and not notarized and other factual disputes such as the testimony of the poll workers, we do not have sufficient evidence to change the results,” he said.

Other members of the North Election Commission are Paul Owens and Beth Ritter.

T&D Correspondent Dale Linder-Altman can be reached by e-mail at jerryanddale@lowcountry.com. Discuss this and other stories online at TheTandD.com.

You must be logged in to comment.