FORTVILLE — A Fortville councilman who narrowly lost his seat in the November election dropped a petition Thursday morning to recount the votes, according to court documents.
Robert Sterrett, through his attorney Michael Griffin, submitted a motion to dismiss the recount Thursday morning, minutes before a recount commission assigned to the case met at 8:30 a.m., according to an email Griffin sent to county officials. Sterrett, a Republican who was appointed to the Fortvile at-large council spot earlier this year, lost in the Nov. 6 race to Independent Fritz Fentz by 43 votes.
At issue in Sterrett’s challenge was straight-ticket voting. Because he was running in an at-large race, straight-ticket Republican votes didn’t count for him; voters instead had to vote individually is his race. Sterrett suggested he legally should have benefited from the straight-ticket votes. He said some voters forgot to “bubble in” his name on the ballot when they voted for a Republican straight ticket. In court earlier in the week, Griffin argued the Fortville at-large position should’ve been tallied with straight-ticket voting.
But Johnson County Judge Kevin Barton, a special judge assigned to the case, essentially threw out that argument in an order late Wednesday. He wrote that “in the event that a straight ticket Republican ballot did not vote for an individual candidate, no vote shall be recorded for the individual candidate.” Barton said a recount would be moot: It would still not count Republican straight-ticket votes for Sterrett if the voters didn’t choose a candidate in that race.
In the Fortville race, straight-ticket voters could either choose Sterrett, Fentz or neither candidate. All county ballots had a statement reminding voters to select at-large and nonpartisan races individually.
Fewer people voted in the Sterrett-Fentz race — 1,275 — compared to the 1,388 votes cast in the town’s District 2 race between Republican Robert Holland and Independent Becky Davis. Holland received 118 more votes than Sterrett. In Fortville, all registered voters can vote for candidates in any district race.
Indiana law states straight-ticket voters must individually select at-large candidates, because many governing boards have multiple at-large seats and the possibility of multiple candidates from the same party running for them. Griffin had claimed the term “at-large” was ambiguous in state statute and referred mainly to multi-member at-large districts. Fortville’s at-large district is a single-person seat.
Barton wrote, “A review of the statutes do not cause the Court to find the terms “an at large district” in Indiana Code … ambiguous.” Barton cited multiples references to state law and dictionary definitions of at-large in his order and said both multi-member and single-member at-large districts shouldn’t be counted on straight-ticket ballots.
Prior to 2016, voters could elect at-large candidates through straight-ticket voting. The Indiana General Assembly changed that section of election law that year. Barton said all Republican straight-ticket ballots in Fortville would’ve counted for Sterrett if he had run for office more than three years ago.
Griffin could not be reached for comment.
Fentz’s attorney, Briane House, wrote in an email to the Daily Reporter: “Following Special Judge Barton’s thorough ruling, I am pleased that Mr. Sterrett has decided to forego the time and expense of the recount.”
Hancock County Clerk Marcia Moore had previously told the court that if a recount was necessary, all 1,400 or so paper ballots cast in four Fortville-area precincts would have to be separated from the more than 34,000 county ballots stored in about 250 sealed cases. Moore said it would have taken several days to separate the ballots.
The recount commission — comprised of Republican Larry Breese, Democrat John Krueger and Hancock County information technology director Bernie Harris — voted on Thursday morning to discharge the commission. They also requested reimbursement from the court, totaling $500 for stipends to the three members. That money will come from the $2,300 bond Sterrett posted for the recount. Sterrett will recover the remaining $1,800.
