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City of Guyton requests that county officials run election
Election

SPRINGFIELD — The Effingham County Board of Elections & Registration wasn’t receptive to a request during its Feb. 8 meeting — at least not at first.

Mayor Russ Deen asked the board to handle the City of Guyton’s next election in November.

“ Unfortunately, with a young city and a small city, my resources are very limited and my staff is very small,” Deen said. “The other aspect I’d like to take into consideration is the last election that the city itself held was not a success. There were questions and I feel it hurt our reputation and worked against us, and worked against Guyton becoming the success it needs to be.”

Guyton’s contentious November 2019 municipal election included a 216-216 tie in the Post 1 race between Marshall Reiser and Tamela Mydell. The Post 2 contest was also controversial as Hursula Pelote believed she shouldn’t have been forced into a runoff.

Pelote garnered 202 votes to Andy Harville’s 175 and Mike Gerwig’s 43 in the general election. 

Guyton’s city charter states, “The person receiving a majority of the votes cast for any city office shall be elected.” Former Mayor Jeff Lariscy, who didn’t seek reelection, countered that Pelote won a plurality of the votes, not a majority.

The Secretary of State’s Office and city attorney declared that a runoff was necessary. It was led in December 2019 by Effingham County elections officials following the resignation of Alison Bruton, Guyton’s elections supervisor and city clerk.

Reiser and Pelote prevailed in the runoffs.

“The follow-up runoff was managed perfectly,” Deen said. “It was beautifully done and helped everyone to feel comfortable with the process, and was viewed as a success by my entire community. It was part of the reason that Guyton was able to move forward and have the great year they we’ve had.”

Accompanied by Pelote and Post 3 Councilman Michael Johnson, Deen asked the board what it would take for Guyton to have “another county-run city election.”

Rose Harvey was the first board member to respond.

She said, “If this board takes on Guyton, we have two other incorporated areas. This board cannot — I mean, are we going to make an exception and do Guyton and not do Springfield and Rincon? I mean, that is my perception, that it’s not fair to the rest of the county to do your election and then say, ‘No, Rincon. We can’t do your election No, Springfield. We can’t do yours.’

“Our staff has indicated that it will be more than happy to work with you to get your people trained. If I’m not mistaken, (the Secretary of State’s Office) has training available. 

“As much as we would like to be able do those things, our staff manpower is limited. We don’t have ... the strain on the staff that we have to take care of county business now — it’s just not fair to our staff.”

Deen then asked Harvey what the county elections office agenda is for 2021.

“The biggest thing is redistricting, which we don’t know at what time that will hit us, with the Census info,” Elections Supervisor Olivia Morgan said. “That is a very time-consuming, very detail-oriented process. The last time we did it in 2012 it took over a year to complete it from start to finish and I’ve never actually done the first part of it, so I’m not sure to what that actually entails for me.”

Morgan said her office is considering splitting eight precincts, thereby gaining that many more to manage.

“That is a huge undertaking in and of itself,” she said.  

Morgan said the county’s also needs update its “processes and procedures” because of the new voting machines that were unveiled last year.

“We need time to rally before 2022,” she said. “Everything we have is based on the old equipment.  We have not updated or had time to update anything. I do intend to ask the county (commission) for a fourth full-time person but, until July, I won’t know if they are going to give us that.”

Morgan said her office handles 20,000 more voters than it did in 2010.

“We all worked a tremendous amount of hours last year to make sure that our elections were good,” she said. “I feel like, you know — I hate to say it, but it feels like if we take on Guyton, then we are taking away from county and state elections.”

“Like I said before,” Harvey interjected, “it’s not just taking on Guyton. It’s the possibility of being pressured to take on Springfield and Rincon, and this staff cannot handle that.”

Harvey then asked Deen if training was available to Guyton election workers.

He said, “Yes, ma’am, there is training available to our staff. At the same time, we are just as limited in our staff and the reality is that the Guyton citizens, Springfield citizens and Rincon citizens also put in the money for this office. 

“We are not just city residents. We are also Effingham County residents and deserve to reap the benefits of a paid-for elections office with a budget $380,000 this year.”

Deen said the City of Guyton was unable to function when its staff handled its November 2019 election.

“Numerous counties throughout the state handle all of their municipal elections,” Deen said. “I recently reached out to Pierce County and that is standing operating procedure (there).”

Deen said the City of Guyton is prepared to pay for Morgan and her staff to handle its August election.

“Elections is what they do” he said. “You have a staff of three and one part-timer. That is my City Hall. That’s my entire administration.

“They not only have to do the elections but also would be required to keep up with the water bills and continue to do all the aspects of what we do. If I had an abundance of staff, I would not be here this morning.”

Harvey responded, “... we have staff that basically worked for free last year because of the requirements and that is not acceptable. It is just not. You would not ask your staff to work without being paid and that is exactly what happened on this board.”

The mayor replied, “Are these salaried positions?”

“Yes,” Harvey answered.

“Then they were paid,” Deen said.

“If you have to work 60 hours a week on a 40-hour salary, I’m sorry, occasionally that works. For extended periods of time, it does not — in my opinion as a board member,” Harvey said.

Deen’s request was tabled until the next board meeting after Chairman Tommy Allen suggested examining ways to help Guyton “without “completely taking over.”