Recount expected for PA judicial election
Monday, November 9th, 2009
A razor-thin margin of victory in one of Pennsylvania's statewide judicial elections is setting the stage for a recount.
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Pennsylvania law requires an automatic recount for margins of victory within a half-percentage point, and the race for the fourth Superior Court seat falls within that range.
Democrats Anne Lazarus and Robert Colville are just 1,500 votes apart, with Republicans Temp Smith and Kevin McCarthy a few thousand tallies behind.
Secretary of State Pedro Cortez can't officially order a recall until counties certify their totals on Tuesday, but Deputy Secretary Harry Van Sickle says once those numbers are submitted, officials will move forward.
Sickle: Then the Secretary would order the recount, which must happen by November 19th. In other words, they must start by November 19th, and must complete by twelve noon on November the 25th.
The recount would take place on the county level, with the state covering the cost.
Officials will look at the "paper tape" trail from touch screen devices, and use machines to count optical scan ballots.
Van Sickle says candidates can opt out of the recount if they want to, and notes this is the first time guidelines passed by the Legislature in 2003 will be put into effect.
[...] Orie Melvin wasn't the only woman to win last week — three female judicial candidates vying for Superior Court seats, each Republican, also emerged victorious. Perhaps most telling, the lone Democrat who might win, Anne Lazarus, is also a woman. She leads Democrat Robert Colville and Republicans Temp Smith and Kevin McCarthy in a race now in a recount. [...]