I’m still catching up from my 10-day working road trip.

One big item I missed while I was away is that Gloucester County GOP Chair Jacci Vigilante, along with Gloucester County Board of Elections Commissioners Carmen DiNovi and George Shivery and Gloucester county Commissioner candidate Chris Konawel filed court papers on August 18 demanding a bipartisan county Board of Elections.

According to the New Jersey Globe a bipartisan Board of Elections is required by state law:

Gloucester County Republicans have filed a lawsuit alleging that the county is denying them a bipartisan county Board of Elections required by state law.

At issue is that for many years, Gloucester County had a shared service agreement between the Board of Elections, the County Clerk's Office and the Superintendent of Elections. This agreement expired in December 2020 and was extended through June 30, 2021. The two Republican Commissioners, DiNovi and Shivery, on the Board of Elections refused to vote to extend the agreement.

The issue with the shared services agreement is that it allowed County government to avoid the hiring of staff dedicated to the Board of Elections. Other counties, Camden County Board of Elections for example, hire an equal number of Democrat and Republican employees, making the Board of Elections truly bipartisan. In other words, Gloucester County Republicans are not seeking anything out of the ordinary.

The problem with the old shared services agreement in Gloucester County is that the agreement allowed the highly partisan County Clerk’s office and Superintendent of Elections to decide who works at the Board of Elections, meaning nearly every single person who handled voted ballots was a Democrat.

The problem with a highly partisan Superintendent of Elections office is that the state legislature clearly intended the office to be bipartisan. In counties of the Second Class, as Gloucester is, Title 19 states:

NJSA 19:32-26.1 Office of deputy superintendent of elections, certain; appointment; term; vacancies; salary

1. The governing body of a county of the second class in which the office of superintendent of elections for the county has been established pursuant to section 1 of P.L.1947, c.167 (C.19:32-26) may establish, by ordinance or resolution, as appropriate, the office of deputy superintendent of elections. The office of deputy superintendent of elections in each such county shall be filled by a suitable person who shall be nominated by the Governor with the advice and consent of the Senate, who shall not be from the same political party as the superintendent of elections, and who shall hold office for a term of five years, running concurrently with the term of the superintendent and until the deputy superintendent's successor is appointed and has qualified. The initial appointment to the office of deputy superintendent of elections may be for a partial term, as appropriate. Vacancies shall be filled in the same manner as the original appointment but shall be for the unexpired term only. The annual salary of a deputy superintendent of elections shall be 90% of the salary received by the superintendent of elections of the same county for performing the duties of superintendent of elections and commissioner of registration. The office of the deputy superintendent of elections shall be located in the county making the appointment.

“Who shall not be from the same part as the superintendent of elections,” is an important phrase.

Perhaps the reason why Gloucester County has never moved to appoint a deputy superintendent of elections is the Democrats simply do not want bipartisanship in an office that has anything to do with counting ballots or the way elections are run in the county.

Who knows? Last year’s Gloucester County Freeholder/Commissioner election was as close as 0.37%, maybe it would have been different if the Gloucester County Board of Elections were a truly bipartisan office.

Here’s hoping this lawsuit brings bipartisanship to Gloucester County’s Board of Elections.