OLD LYME — UPDATED NOV. 8 at 2:40pm — Old Lyme Republican Registrar Cathy Carter has confirmed to LymeLine by email this morning that there will only be one recount this evening for Old Lyme Zoning Commission position with a five-year term beginning 2022.
She explained that the results for the fourth position on the Region 18 Board of Education (BOE) were “… read incorrectly on Election night, however a tape from the tabulator was posted for public viewing with the correct numbers.”
Carter said she will confirm to LymeLine this afternoon where and when the tape was posted.
She added, the final vote counts for BOE candidates Christopher Staab (R) and Alexander Lowry (D) were respectively 1578 and 1555, thus giving Staab a margin of victory of 23 votes.
This 23-margin difference places the result just outside the number needed to generate an automatic recount; a margin of 20 votes or less triggers an automatic recount.
We will update this story with new information as soon as we receive it.
OLD LYME — An announcement on the Town of Old Lyme website states, “The Old Lyme Registrars of Voters will conduct a recount of the votes cast for the Zoning Commission member having a five-year term beginning in 2022 on Monday, 8 November 2021 at 6:00 pm in the Mezzanine Conference Room of the Old Lyme Town Hall.”
The unofficial results from Tuesdays’ election in this race were:
Mary Jo Nosal (D): 1,600
Sloan Danenhower (R): 1,593
with Mary Jo Nosal being declared the unofficial winner. The margin of seven votes generates an automatic recount since Connecticut state law requires an automatic recount when the margin of victory is less than 0.5 percent of total votes cast for any office or fewer than 20 votes.
An automatic recount was also generated in the Old Lyme Board of Finance Alternate race where the unofficial results were as follows:
Sarah E. Michaelson (D): 1,621
Katherine Thuma (D): 1,630
Matthew Olsen (R): 1,754
Maria Marchant (R): 1,709
Thuma, Olsen and Marchant were declared unofficial winners, but the margin between Michaelson and Thuma potentially called for a recount since that difference in total votes between the candidates was nine votes. The New London Day reports, however, that Michaelson has waived her right to a recount.
We have not yet received details of a recount for the fourth member of the Region 18 Board of Education, where the unofficial results were:
Christopher Staab (R): 1,578
Alexander Lowry (D): 1,568
with Christopher Staab being declared the unofficial winner. This margin of 10 votes would also generate an automatic recount.
Old Lyme First Selectman Timothy Griswold stated in his Friday newsletter to the community, “Because the vote counts of two elected officials were within fifteen votes of each other, there will be a recount of their votes on Monday.”
He did not respond to our request for more information on when the second recount would be held.
11/7 UPDATE at 1 a.m: We note the New London Day is now reporting the number of votes cast respectively for Staab and Lowry as follows:
Christopher Staab (R): 1,578
Alexander Lowry (D): 1,555
This 23-margin difference places the result just outside the number needed to generate an automatic recount since it is more than 20 votes.
It appears the initial vote tallies announced on election night for this specific office were incorrect and that they have now been corrected. We are unclear at this point whether a recount for this seat will be held since we have not received an official response to that question yet.
We will update the information on the potential second recount as soon as we receive it.
It is worth noting that several of the races in question were decided by less than .5% of the votes cast, and are by Connecticut state law subject to a mandatory recount built into our election laws. As such, a potential recount does not imply malfeasance on the part of anyone, but is simply a procedural safeguard. I hope that anyone wishing to leverage this moment to expand division or fuel political acrimony will stop, think, get the facts and exercise sound, informed judgement in their response to this recount.
Thank you, Mr. Lowry. I know that there was a little bit of confusion regarding the recount requirement. This clears it up nicely.
Are we tying to identify a problem where there is no problem? This is am implied warning that fuels , not eliminates, bad behavior.