Board of Elections & Registration - Regular Meeting

Bye.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

With parties involved, I would like to be recused from this. I don't want to be involved in any discussion, voting or anything. Don't want to be in a conflict with the board or with the process. Can you hear me? You can hear me? Okay, I'm sorry. I'm asking to respectfully be recused from this matter due to the involvement with the parties that are involved. I am recusing myself from any voting and discussion deliberation regarding the matter of the recall.

With Ms. Maynor-Knight recusing herself, we still have a quorum, and you may leave at this time. Thank you. Public comments for agenda items only, please. Please, if you come to the podium, state your name and your address, please. Anybody with comments?

No.

Your name and address, please.

John Ralph Burns, Jr., 109 Yvonne Avenue, Woodbine, Georgia. Other than getting a phone call, I haven't been told what the agenda is.

Do we have copies of the agenda on the back table? And Ms. Lynn is going to give you one as well. Okay, thank you. Yes, sir. Thank you. Yes, sir. Anybody else? Okay, we'll close public comments at this time. Thank you. The first and only new business is approval to request an extension from Superior Court for an extra five days to review recall petition application signatures for the City of Woodbine's Council Member Baird. Up on the screen right now is the official code. It discusses the fact that the election superintendent is granted unrestricted authorized access to the registration records maintained by the Board of Registrars and that the election superintendent finds any signer is not qualified, is not qualified elect or eligible to sign the application, such signatures shall not be counted. It goes on to further state that the election superintendent shall certify the legal sufficiency or insufficiency of the application for a recall petition within five days after receiving the application, excluding Saturday, Sunday, and legal holidays. It also gives a little privy to the fact that a judge of the Superior Court may, upon proper application and good cause, show and grant additional periods of time not to exceed 15 days for the election superintendent and the verification of the application. Mr. Carter, your office. You are the acting supervisor of elections. At our last meeting, this board charged your office as supervisor to review each signature, each signer as a qualified elector eligible to sign the application process. Is that correct?

That is correct.

Okay. Tell us the procedure that your office is using to make those determinations.

We're using the procedure that is given to us from the Secretary of State's office, whereby, excuse me, We take the signatures of the respondents, verify that they are indeed citizens of the city of Woodbine, they're registered in the city of Woodbine, and also active voters. And there were active voters at the time of the last election of said party being on the ballot.

As of today, have you satisfactorily completed the review of the qualified electors?

No, ma'am, we have not.

Could you explain to us a little about what you've got going on in your office right now?

Yes, ma'am. We're in the middle of a runoff election. We also have a statewide recount that's upcoming as well as early processing of absentee ballots that we've received for the runoff as well as a risk-limiting audit for the runoff itself.

If approved, what are those five extra days going to get you?

It will allow us time to further vent and complete the signatures that we have received to make sure that they are bonafide residents of the City of Woodbine.

Okay. Board, do you have any other questions at this time? Mr. Holland?

None at this time.

Okay. May we have a motion to request an additional period of time not to exceed five days for the election superintendent to verify the application?

Madam Chair, I move to make application to the judge of Superior Court as per Georgia Election Code 21-4-5, little f2, requesting a five-day extension through June 22nd. to allow a thorough examination of the signatures on the recall application pertaining to Councilman Baird.

Do we have a second?

I second that motion.

All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? None. That motion passes. We've got some important, do we have anything else from the supervisors other than that?

No, ma'am, we do not.

Thank you. We've got some important dates coming up. General primary runoff is tomorrow, Tuesday, June 16th. We've got Juneteenth holiday, Friday, the offices are closed. We have a special called board meeting Monday, June 22nd, to certify those elections. And Independence Day is observed Friday, July 3rd. The offices are also closed. Do we have any additional comments?

Madam Chair, I'd like to make some clarification comments, if that's okay with you. Go ahead. There's been some misunderstandings, I believe, of the superintendent's role for Woodbine or any other city in Camden County or municipality in Camden County.

Put that closer. They can't hear you.

And what we have is a mutual agreement with the municipalities to do all the election functions as a superintendent, which is the five-member board is the superintendent of elections for Camden County. So we have a a mutual agreement to do everything except to qualify candidates. So there seemed to be some question that I've heard some things about that we weren't in our purview to do this, but therefore they need to refer back to that agreement that was signed in, I want to say 2020, I believe it was. And it's good until end of next year. So I just wanted to make that clear. And thank you, Madam Chair.

Any other comments? We get a motion to adjourn the meeting. Do you have additional public comments? I just asked. Oh, I'm sorry.

I said public.

It's okay. Sorry, Katie. Thank you for keeping us in check. Any other public comments? Go ahead. I thought we had done that, but thank you. That's okay.

So our understanding as the recall committee or the concerned citizens, which I like to refer us to as, we will get a verification of the signatures by the end of day 22nd, or will it be the next day? Because we're trying to plan our meetings and our agendas also.

Give me just a second. Let's take a look at that calendar and keep in mind we've got June, we've got some holidays in there too. So let's make sure we've got our five days. And give us a date, please.

Okay.

We're at close of business today, so today is not being counted.

And as per code, you don't count weekends or holidays?

Holidays or weekends. Rock?

June 24th, end of business.

End of business day, June 24th.

So will we be notified by 5 o'clock the 24th, or will we be notified the next morning a.m. when everybody gets to work?

We'll notify you by end of business on June the 24th.

Okay, cool. So we can start our meeting then, or our future agenda then.

Okay.

Thank you so much.

Yes, sir. Any other comments? Okay. Motion to adjourn the meeting.

Madam Chairman, I make a motion that we adjourn the meeting.

Second. Second. All those in favor? Aye.

Aye.

Meeting's adjourned.