Editor’s note: The story “WLCA candidate files dispute after recounts don’t match” on 05.05.15 was run after candidate Lynn Buehler made the announcement that he chose not to proceed with the filing.
Former Walden Lake Community Association candidate Lynn Buehler is no longer filing a petition for arbitration for election dispute after he asked for two recounts of the April 9 election for three board members and found a different outcome each time.
In the official tally, there are just four votes between Lynn Buehler, 289, and winner Jan Griffin, 293. Because of the closeness, Buehler asked for a recount.
“Two separate attorney’s have advised that going through a complete arbitration filing could cost anywhere from $20,000 to $60,000 in additional attorney fees,” Buehler wrote in a statement. “If for whatever reason I didn’t prevail in the arbitration (and who knows how an arbitrator is thinking, i.e. could be biased in favor of the Association per one of the attorney’s I spoke with) I have decided not to file because I can’t afford the possible costs involved. Once again the “little” guy doesn’t stand a chance against the “establishment.”
The first recount was done April 22. The WLCA monitored Buehler as he counted. He was not allowed to touch the proxies or ballots. The result came out to a significant win for Buehler.
He asked to do another recount, with two, signed witnesses, to be sure. The second recount was April 27. The votes came out in Griffin’s favor, but only by one vote.
“During this recount, we found several proxies (which had me selected as the candidate voted for) had the word ‘BALLOT’ written on them with yellow voting ballots affixed behind them,” Buehler said in a letter. “When we asked the supervisor of elections (who is also WLCA’s attorney) he stated that the reason ‘BALLOT’ was written across the proxies is because it probably meant the voter had decided to vote in person by yellow ballot, and therefore, their proxies would not count so the vote didn’t get counted twice.”
Buehler contacted several of the voters whose proxies had ballots stapled to them to ask if they had voted in person or submitted yellow ballots instead of their proxies. He found that several did not submit a ballot or rescind their proxies. He was able to get several signed affidavits.
Besides the confusion with the ballots, two proxies were stamped “not listed,” meaning that the proxy submitter is not listed on the WLCA resident list. The individuals who signed these proxies were legal property owners, therefore, their votes should have counted.
Another proxy was undated. Undated proxies are invalid according to Florida Statute 720: “To be valid, a proxy must be dated, must state the date, time, and place of the meeting for which it was given.”
A fourth proxy did not have a property address listed, leading to more ambiguity if a vote was double cast by a particular property owner. Without a property address, there is no way to check.
“I think everyone agrees we need to improve upon the process,” WLCA President Bob Hunter said. “People came out the night of the meeting in great numbers. It was overwhelming. We need to enforce a more stringent process.”
Buehler also thought the process was confusing.
“Even if I wasn’t to win, there was such a mass confusion,” Buehler said. “People didn’t know where to go, which were voters and proxies.”
At a special meeting, Buehler asked for an official recount instead of filing arbitration. But the WLCA chose to let Buehler proceed with filing.
“I was hoping at least the current board would hold their own recount, but that didn’t happen, and it’s ironic that they took the advice of their attorney who was the supervisor of the election and basically developed the election process itself,” Buehler wrote.
“Either way, I effectively would lose since if the Association loses, it comes out of their/we the homeowners’ budget, and we would be losing some improvements that those funds were slated for and used instead to pay WLCA and my attorney fees. However, I do feel that with the attention this election has received that a lesson has been learned and that the integrity of all future elections will be much better and the election process itself will be much better controlled,” Buehler wrote.
