Officials say residents of the Lakeland area will have the results of the United Conservative Party nomination election soon but the board needs to review eight ballots.
The UCP party board is meeting today to review eight ballots that were deemed ineligible by the Bonnyville-Cold Lake-St. Paul constituency association during the vote counts.Â
7 ballots were rejected by the Returning Officer on election night with an additional ballot objected to by a Scrutineer but accepted by the Returning Officer and subsequently disputed by the Scrutineer.
Since the number of disputed ballots exceeded the margin of victory all 8 disputed ballots needed to be presented to the Board for a determination at a Board meeting today.
The initial count saw David Hanson lead with 288 votes with Scott Cyr behind at 250 votes and finally, Greg Sawchuk claimed 185 votes. Since a majority was not reached Sawchuk was eliminated. With the new vote count, Cyr came out on top with 312 votes to Hanson’s 311.
The UCP granted an appeal from Hanson and set a recount for last Tuesday, December 20. The UCP members are expected to receive an email on Friday morning with the results. If the vote comes out as a tie, a coin will be flipped for the winner.
But the Bonnyville-Cold Lake-St. Paul UCP nomination Ron Young says it is unlikely the result will have to be decided using the coin.
“In the count, there was one ballot that shifted and somehow ended up in the Hanson pile that was marked with Scott. So now the gap is two and not one.”
Young says there are enough ballots in dispute that the outcome is still unknown but a change in winners looks unlikely.