"Panel won't certify race for Senate: Members expect justices to decide residency dispute" is the headline to this story today in the Louisville Courier Journal.
Earlier ILB entries on this issue were posted on 12/8/04, 12/3/04, and 11/25/04.
Today's LCJ reports:
The Kentucky Board of Elections refused yesterday to certify the election of Democrat Virginia Woodward to the state Senate, saying it didn't want to wade into a battle that it expects to end before the state Supreme Court.[Updated 12/16/04] The LCJ is reporting today that:Rejecting the advice of the board's lawyer, who said it was required by law to certify the election, the three Republicans and three Democrats voted unanimously to table the matter.
If that decision stands, it means that neither Woodward nor her Republican opponent, Dana Seum Stephenson, will have the certification needed to be sworn in as the 37th District senator when the General Assembly meets next month. The campaign was thrown into disarray on the day before the Nov.2 general election, when Woodward filed suit claiming that Stephenson didn't meet residency requirements.
Stephenson got about a thousand more votes than Woodward, but three weeks after the election, a Jefferson Circuit judge ordered that Stephenson's votes not be counted.
Stephenson admitted that she lived in Indiana during four of the six years before the election, and Judge Barry Willett ruled that she did not meet a constitutional requirement that she be a Kentucky resident for the six years prior to her election.
Stephenson has, however, asked the Republican-controlled Senate to determine that she is the winner and seat her.
Democrat Virginia Woodward filed suit yesterday, asking a judge to end her battle with Dana Seum Stephenson for the 37th District seat in the state Senate.Posted by Marcia Oddi at December 14, 2004 10:26 AMWoodward asked Franklin Circuit Court to force the state Board of Elections to certify her as the winner of last month's election and order Stephenson, a Republican, to drop her bid to win the seat.