Politics & Government

Impound Order on Rockand Ballots Lifted

The impound order holding up election results in Rockland, Westchester, Dutchess, Putnam and Orange Counties was lifted shortly before 4:30 p.m. Wednesday afternoon.

Rockland County Elections Commissioner Louis Babcock confirmed that the process of moving from unofficial to certified results can now move forward starting with audits Thursday.

"We plan on doing any objections filed with us Friday," Babcock said. "Anyone objecting on any of the races, they have to get that to us by Thursday evening and let us know. We already have objections regarding the Orangetown race and the Spring Valley race. We will be hearing those."

They will be going through the ballots already counted and addressing objections with the candidates and their legal counsel Friday.

In the race for Orangetown Supervisor, Repbulican challenger Walter Wettje, Jr. had an advantage of 36 votes over Democratic incumbent Andy Stewart when the unofficial results came out election night Nov. 5. In the race for mayor of the Village of Spring Valley, the unofficial tally had Demeza Delhomme with 1,407 votes to 1,316 for Bernard Charles, Jr. Those totals do not include absentee ballots. 

Babcock said there are approximately 1,000 absentee ballots to be counted for the Spring Valley race and 460 in Orangetown. 

Babcock said they would be counting absentee ballots in Stony Point and Haverstraw Monday, but they will hold off on Orangetown, Clarkstown and East Ramapo until Tuesday to give any court cases time to be settled. He said the counting of absentee ballots usually takes a day.

"We will declare winners, probably, late next week," Babcock said. 

To read more about the impound order that held up the ballots, see this report on Patch. 

"It's a little frustrating, but the main thing is, you want every person who voted to have their votes counted," Stewart said of the process Tuesday, before the impound order was lifted. "It takes a little while,"


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