This just in from Ben Fenton, village trustee in Fleischmanns, about this morning's electoral recount for the position of village mayor. Fenton reports that incumbent mayor Dave Morrell still wins the election, but only by a razor-thin two votes: 37 to 35.
The original count had Morrell winning 37 votes to challenger Fred Woller's 33 votes. After the recount, which featured Bush-Gore Florida-style ballot-by-ballot examination, officials from the Delaware County Board of Elections added two ballots to Woller's tally, Fenton reports:
This morning two representatives from the Delaware County Board of Elections came from Delhi to Fleischmanns to do a final count of the votes. There were three ballots that were deemed void by the elections officials on the night of the election. Two of those ballots were ruled as valid. Even though the voter had made a check mark instead of filling in the circle as instructed, the voter's intent was clear. As was mentioned by the Board of Elections official, "As long as the voter's intent is clear, it's a valid ballot." The third ballot remained void because the person had marked in two spaces in the mayoral column (a mark for David Morell and a mark in the "write in" section). So, the final count was 37 votes for Mayor David Morell, and 35 votes for Trustee Fred Woller.
