Recount recruiting a joint effort
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Staff Report - Published: September 2, 2010
The unity tour by the Democratic candidates for governor continues. Five candidates ran for the party's nomination, a primary in which Peter Shumlin is the apparent victor. But the margin of victory, less than 200 votes, was small enough that second-place finisher Doug Racine has asked for a recount.
However, that has not kept Shumlin and Racine, or the other three candidates, from collaborating both to criticize the sole Republican in the campaign, Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie, and to participate in fund-raising and other campaign events together.
On Wednesday the five candidates asked for volunteers to help in the recount effort. Ordinarily, for instance in a recount between candidates of different parties, each side has volunteers overseeing vote counting to ensure accuracy and fairness. This time, in part to speed up the effort, the Democrats in the unusual primary recount have agreed to use the same observers.
There will still have to be a substantial number of volunteers, however. That's in part because ballots from each county in the state are recounted, either by machine or by hand, at the local courthouse. That means as many as 40 volunteers must be found in each county, a list which recount officials would like to start selecting from as early as Friday, according to the Democrats.
“In order to make this process happen as quickly as possible, all five of us have agreed to put out the call generally and nominate the volunteers together,” Shumlin said in a request for volunteers sent to his supporters.
Racine Campaign Manager Amy Shollenberger said in large part the decision for all five of the candidates to send out a message seeking mutually acceptable volunteers for the recount was an effort to speed the process along.
“If all five candidates are helping to recruit volunteers it will go faster,” she said.
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