Canceling election is illegal
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Ah, for those halcyon days before the Water Compact when Irrigation District elections were sleepy affairs without much controversy. However, since the introduction of the Compact both those pro and con forces have determined that District elections are extremely important. And we at Lake County (both the County Attorney’s Office and the Elections Office) agree completely. However, it is Lake County’s responsibility to administer the election for the Flathead Joint Board of Control (Board) within the laws of the State of Montana. Unfortunately, in the past there were elections that may not have been in accordance with the law. As a result, we have taken steps to bring the elections into compliance for the first time ever.
There is a Letter to the Editor on 27 April that says Lake County needs to cancel the election because of illegalities. Like much of the rest of the letter, it is factually incorrect and I would like to take a few minutes to address them.
First, the election last year identified a problem in that out of state owners or foreign (out of state) corporations are not allowed to vote in elections unless they have a designated proxy who is a Montana elector to cast their votes for them. Before last year, those entities may have voted their ballots illegally. Having identified the issue, Lake County worked with the Board to identify solutions that would be compliant with the law. Our determination was that the designation of who could vote shares would require a notarized form that showed the designated elector and that form needed to be filed with the Lake County Elections Office in order to receive the ballots. This was imparted to the Board on Feb. 29, which is more than enough time to inform their electors of the requirement.
On the day that the ballots were to be mailed, we sent them to all of the electors who were eligible to vote either their own blocks, or as a proxy. Ballots were sent to the 2,392 people who were compliant but we did not send them to the 754 people who were not. To use an analogy, it would be the same as sending absentee ballots to people who were not registered to vote.
However, as in a general election, if a voter in the District was to bring to us a notarized form saying that they had the authority to vote the block we would immediately give them their ballot and record their vote. We will continue to do so until 8 p.m. on the 3rd of May when the election closes. Because all of the eligible voters had their ballots sent on the same day, there is no violation of the law that would necessitate canceling the election.
Much misinformation has to do with the Board’s attorneys who were apparently looking for any excuse to cancel the election, speaking with Mr. Wally Congdon, my Civil Deputy. Wally did spend two hours with their attorneys, but that was just to identify that if there was an illegality the remedy was to cancel the election. Wally did not say that there was any legal reason to cancel the election.
Further misinformation was that the Board had invited Lake County officials to their meeting and that they had refused. That is completely false. None of the Commissioners were ever invited, nor was anyone from my office or the Elections Office.
There is no legal reason to cancel the election. In fact, to cancel the election would be itself illegal.
