Special Election: Director of Elections
Director Of Elections Ballot
A few weeks ago I received a King County special elections ballot in the mail. Curious, I opened it and discovered only one race on this ballot. Disgusted with this waste of tax payer dollars ($3million estimated spent on this alone), I tossed the ballot in the stack of mail designed “To Be Sorted Later” and promptly forgot about it. Well, that is until I read a recent article about this election essentially depicting the candidates as a group of nit-picking, name-calling, dirty-trick-pulling children.
To summarize:
- Sherril Huff: the reluctant incumbent. Denies misleading anyone. Heavily encouraged by Ron Sims to run for the seat, rented a house in the county limits the day before registration ended though didn’t move in until the week afterward. Due to Clifford’s allegations, there is a lawsuit pending over whether Huff is eligible to run or not.
- Julie Kempf: running because someone left a nasty note on her car. “It’s a really, really bad day when people don’t run for office when some scum is running around leaving notes on windshields.” Arrested in an investigation of forgery, theft, criminal impersonation and assault, fired from her job as elections superintendent in 2003 (article). Kempf declares that she was never charged with forgery, theft, et al.
- Chris Clifford: declares Kempf to be a liar and the other 4 candidates gutless.
- David Irons: apparently hit his mother, though he dismisses this as routine family squabbling. He has put nearly $100,000 of his own money into the race.
- Pam Roach: reprimanded in 2003 by a Senate committee over the resignations of two of her legislative aides; it also was reported that she had pulled a gun on an aide, though she claims that the event was different than what was claimed by others. She sponsored the “top two” primary bill.
- Bill Anderson: first time running for office.
I think I will still throw my ballot out. This race is a joke.
Oh, c’mon. There’s only one qualified candidate in this entire morass of idiocy. Fill it out, mail it in, and go yell at the King County Republicans who thought that making the Director of Elections an elected position was a good idea.
Yell at the King County Republicans if you want, but they didn’t make this an elected position. The voters did: By voting for it 56%-44%, in each of 2 consecutive elections. Trust me, colin. There aren’t enough Republicans in King County to pull 56% of the vote for anything, let alone twice, unless there are an awful lot of independents and Democrats who are already on their side of the issue.
:)
The race may be a joke, but you only have all the people who voted in favor of it to blame.
I see no qualms in voting for director of elections in a normal election cycle. It’s odd to have a special election that costs so much dedicated to this, and to have so much petty fighting among the candidates.