Husband plans to fill ballot vacancy created by his wife’s death

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The husband of a 56-year-old woman whose death earlier this month left a vacancy on the Nov. 6 general election ballot for Pershing Township trustee has agreed to fill that spot.

Tim Edington of Freetown filed the paperwork needed to make that move Thursday morning at the Jackson County clerk’s office in courthouse at Brownstown.

That means the county will now have to spend the $11,000 it will cost to reprint the ballot, replacing Theresa Edington’s name with the name of her husband, county Clerk Amanda Lowery said.

Theresa Edington had been set to square off against Republican Sharon Yost of Freetown. Bruce McKinney, a Democrat who was first elected Nov. 7, 2006, opted not to run this year.

The Jackson County Election Board, which consists of Lowery, Republican Tom Terkhorn of Seymour and Democrat Julie Rohlfing of Brownstown, conducted a special meeting Tuesday morning at the courthouse in Brownstown to discuss the issue of the vacancy created by Theresa Edington’s death Oct. 4.

State law allows a political party 30 days to fill a ballot vacancy created by the death of a candidate.

The board has notified its vendor, RBM Consulting of Minnesota, the possibility of having to reprogram all of the voting machines. It’s not possible to reprogram just one machine, Lowery said.

She also made the county council aware of the issue during their meeting Monday night, and the $11,000 needed to pay for the cost of reprinting 450 paper ballots and reprogramming voting machines will come from the county’s rainy day fund.

Lowery said Thursday afternoon she had already signed off on proof of new ballot with the name change to the process.

Pershing Township has 956 registered voters. In the May 8 primary election, 267 people voted. In the last general election Nov. 8, 2016, 465 people cast ballots in the township.

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