District 9 Congressional race to be recounted
Police confiscate election machines, ballots
Wanda English Burnett - Editor

With eight minutes until the deadline cutoff to file for a recount, Kip Tew, Chairman of the Indiana State Democratic Central Committee, filed a petition on November 12 at 11:52 a.m., that will see the race of District 9, United States Representative recounted.

That recount includes Ripley County and at about 10:30 p.m. on November 12, Ripley County Clerk Ginger Bradford received a call from state police saying she would need to go to the courthouse and release the voting machines and ballots. The order called for the impoundment of all absentee ballots, ballot cards, voting machines, tally sheets and poll lists used at the election for casting votes.

Bradford then called Election Board members Everett Thompson and Paul Mathews, who hold the keys to the cabinets where the election equipment and ballots are stored. They, along with Bradford and Election Deputy Marilyn Hunt, met with five officers from the Indiana State Police on the second floor of the courthouse in Versailles.

Police locked the ballots and machines in cabinets with padlocks and confiscated everything that concerned this year's election.

"We left here about 1:50 a.m. Saturday morning," noted Bradford. She said she has never experienced a recount so this was all new to her.

The race for the 9th District Congressional seat was close with incumbent Baron Hill, Democrat, receiving 140,772 votes; Mike Sodrel, Republican, receiving 142,257 votes, and Al Cox, Libertarian getting 4,699 votes.

According to Bradford, due to a malfunction with the voting machines in Franklin County this election, officials believe there could be a chance the slight margin Sodrel won by could be wrong. The petition verifies that Franklin and Dubois counties both had problems with malfunctions in the voting machines. The same type of machines were
used in Ripley, Scott, and Switzerland counties.

In the Verified Petition for Recount and Contest that was filed, it notes that it is believed that "a mistake occurred in the programming of a voting machine or an electronic voting system, making it impossible to determine the candidate who received the highest number of votes."

Now all of the 11,962 ballots from Ripley County will be counted by hand. That process will begin December 6, with 10 teams, each having a Democrat and Republican, counting the ballots and matching the figures.

Not only Ripley County, but 19 other counties as well have been impacted by the recount. According to Bradford, since the recount petition

was filed by the Indiana State Democratic Central Committee, they are the ones responsible for the cost involved. That cost has been estimated at about $65,000.

Bradford noted that the recount does not impact any other races for Ripley County except the Hill/Sodrel/Cox race.