Springs election results upheld/ Outcome recorded after slight delay

0 Comments | Gazette, The (Colorado Springs), Apr 3, 2003 | by ED SEALOVER

No surprise winners emerged when Colorado Springs City Clerk Kathryn Young wrapped up her count Wednesday night of mail ballots from Tuesday's municipal election, 24 hours after the final votes were submitted.

Lionel Rivera remained the new mayor; six council members-elect held on to races they led late Tuesday; and the Trails, Open Space and Parks tax still was extended, by more than a 2-to-1 margin.

Most members of the new council went to bed after Tuesday's election far enough ahead to declare themselves the winners. But the unofficial count paused for the night with 91 percent of ballots recorded.

Young announced the count reached 99.95 percent at 7:44 p.m. Wednesday. The total will hit 100 percent when she certifies the election within the next week, she said.

Problems verifying the signatures of more than 80,000 voters who cast ballots caused the delay, Young said.

Officials checked the signatures against voter registration records at the El Paso County Clerk and Recorder's Office. Images of most signatures were given to Young so she could cross-check them at the City Administration Building.

The city clerk's computer system, however, was unable to run a program from the county containing about 14,000 signatures - most of them from older records, county Clerk Bob Balink said. So Young and her workers hauled ballots to the county office to do that double- checking.

More than 5,000 voters dropped off ballots at the clerk's office and two police substations on the final day, adding to the delay. A steady stream of residents marched into the office Tuesday, some pulling up to the building and running ballots in right at the 7 p.m. deadline.

Young said she was more concerned about making sure each vote was valid than about the time it took to count them.

"If we're a little late getting the figures out, I think that's worth it to make sure we've verified every signature," she said.

But City Councilman-elect Tom Gallagher said if any races had been close, the extra 24 hours would have been difficult for the candidates and their supporters.

"It's that pesky Bush-Gore thing," Gallagher said, referring to the 2000 presidential election that dragged on for more than a month past Election Day.

The city should be able to upgrade its system to accept all the county's signatures if it conducts a mail-ballot election again in April 2005, meaning results could be final within hours, Young said.

The city clerk preferred to focus instead on the 80,548 people who voted in the mayoral race - 57 percent of the 141,000 active voters who received ballots and a record turnout for a city election.

Others say it is more accurate to calculate the voting total from the 222,000 registered voters in the city - including 81,000 who are inactive and did not get ballots. That would drop turnout to 36.3 percent, still a record for a city election, Young said.

Rivera collected 34 percent of the vote, outpacing fellow council members Ted Eastburn with 25 percent, Sallie Clark with 24 percent and Jim Null with 10 percent.

Scott Hente captured the District 1 seat with 36 percent of the vote, and Jerry Heimlicher won the five-person District 3 field with 37 percent. Tom Gallagher, Richard Skorman, Randy Purvis and Larry Small won the four at-large seats from an 11-person field.

The 0.1-cent TOPS tax got a 16-year extension to 2025 with 54,527 votes - 68.3 percent of the total.

CONTACT THE WRITER: 636-0184 or sealover@gazette.com