Tomorrow, there will be a runoff election in Hinds County, where Jackson, Mississippi and most of its suburbs are located. Hopefully, all goes well this time — The Clarion-Ledger reported that “Hinds County Election Commission Chairwoman Connie Cochran admitted [November 10th, 2014] that she broke the law by not ordering the required number of ballots for [the November 4th] general election.” (emphasis added)
State law requires that ballots be available for 75% of registered voters, but Chairwoman Cochran bought enough ballots for less than half that – just over 58,000 ballots were available for 155,912 registered voters. As such, the county ran out of ballots.
That report explains:
“Hinds County District 1 Supervisor Robert Graham told The Clarion-Ledger last week that he would ask the board to assign a legal team to investigate the matter, but Hinds County District 3 Supervisor Peggy Hobson-Calhoun said Tuesday that the county board has no authority to penalize election commissioners. Instead, she said, any investigation and punishment falls on the shoulders of the Attorney General’s office.
‘This was just very, very unfortunate,’ Hobson-Calhoun said. ‘Election commissioners are elected officials and are accountable for their own actions. This experience has undoubtedly put the commissioners on alert that they should follow the (state) statutes.’”
Given all the commotion, the Hinds County runoff election tomorrow for two jude races will likely run smoothly, but if not, count on Legal Reader to provide all the updates you need.
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