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E-mail StoryBarnett takes heat for ballot troubles
| Wednesday, Jun 7 2006 10:05 PM
Last Updated: Wednesday, Jun 7 2006 10:09 PM
Newly re-elected Kern County Auditor-Controller Ann Barnett was under fire Wednesday after overseeing a bumble-filled election on Tuesday.
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"The six-six-six election was one of the worst elections we have had in our county," county Supervisor Michael Rubio said.
Supervisors are calling for control of the Kern County Elections Department to be stripped from Barnett's office.
Barnett said she isn't ready to give up elections, which is tied to separate duties as county clerk, auditor and controller.
"I love every part of my job and I think that, even though we have had bumps along the road, we have done a pretty darn good job," Barnett said.
Elections should be a stand-alone county agency, said Supervisor Don Maben, who was also re-elected Tuesday.
But any attempt to take elections away from Barnett could face serious legal challenges, according to a county memo from February 2005.
The memos argue that, since Barnett is elected to her position, her duties cannot be easily altered in the middle of her elected term.
But Tuesday's ballot box troubles will not be easily set aside, said county and state officials.
Election Day was a string of mishaps, delays and frustrations for Kern County voters.
Some left polling places without voting because shiny new electronic voting machines weren't working and there were no paper ballots or poll workers hadn't been trained to use them.
Election workers asked them to come back later.
Sheriff's Sgt. J.R. Rodriguez -- one of seven sheriff candidates on Tuesday's ballot -- said he and his wife were in line at their polling site when poll workers told voters to go home.
And, when polling places closed and sent in the ballots that were counted, elections computers had trouble digesting both electronic and paper formats.
Updated election results were unavailable for hours. Final results weren't known until around 3:30 a.m. Wednesday.
Barnett said that once cast, no votes went uncounted because of the technical difficulties.
But she said she was troubled that people left polling places without casting ballots because of the glitches.
Barnett said the bulk of the problems encountered by her staff Tuesday were relatively routine considering voters were using the new touch-screen voting system for the first time.
"I do think that those who are commenting don't have a really good idea of the processes we go through," she said.
Touch-screen voting equipment that was supposed to streamline the election performed no better than old-fashioned paper-ballot equipment, critics said Tuesday.
State Sen. Roy Ashburn said he talked to Secretary of State Bruce McPherson Wednesday morning and asked him to investigate what happened.
"He was already aware that there were major problems in Kern County," Ashburn said. "I have asked him to conduct an investigation and, based on the facts, decide what appropriate steps need to be taken."
Ashburn said McPherson told him that no other California county experienced Kern's problems.
Barnett said she talked to McPherson's office Wednesday and his staff commended hers on their reaction to the problems.
But McPherson himself gives a different impression.
He said it was a complicated election with new technology statewide and some hiccups were expected, but nothing as bad as what happened here.
"What we witnessed in Kern County were administrative errors," McPherson said. "The county election officials did not clear the voter activation cards in line with clear directions in the (Diebold) use procedure manuals."
Barnett said the county didn't have those procedure manuals.
McPherson also said election officials are "directed" to have enough paper ballots at each polling place to "offset any kind of a hiccup in the voting process."
Kim Alexander, president of the California Voter Foundation, said Kern County allowed poorly handled technology to short-circuit people's right to vote.
"There's no good reason for anyone to be turned away at the polls. Problems are inevitable," she said, but the scale of the problems in Kern County was very troubling.
Alexander's organization advocates for voter rights and has been critical of uncontrolled implementation of new voting technology.
Maben said that next week, he will ask fellow supervisors to draft a letter asking McPherson to take control of the Kern County Elections Department.
Maben said Barnett has proven she should not have control of the county's elections.
"I was one of the guys that stood by her a couple years ago," he said. "I said 'If it's not broke don't fix it.' Well it's broke."
Rubio and Supervisor Jon McQuiston tried to remove elections from Barnett's control in early 2005.
But Maben and Supervisors Barbara Patrick and Ray Watson voted the idea down.
Rubio said the elections process is too critical to be stuck under the authority of the Auditor-Controller's office, which is already responsible for the critical task of auditing the county's mammoth budget.
Everyone needs to answer for Tuesdays' problems, he said.
"The responsibility lies with the person in charge and last night, that was Ann Barnett," Rubio said. But "where the buck ultimately stops is with the Board of Supervisors and that's myself and my four colleagues."
-- Staff writers Gretchen Wenner and Vic Pollard contributed to this report.