July 3, 2008 Issue                                       

©2007 The Chestnut Hill Local

Some on board express regret for election controversy
Committee formed to review election procedures
by Pete Mazzaccaro

At a community meeting on Monday, June 23, Chestnut Hill Community Association board member Dr. George Spaeth said the recent association election obviously “stinks” but wondered what the community was prepared to do about it. A story on that meeting, which was published last week on our Web site. (Photo by Jimmy J. Pack Jr.)

About a dozen Chestnut Hill residents attended last week’s Chestnut Hill Community Association Board of Directors meeting, seeking answers from board members about this year’s association election, which they believed had been tainted by vote tampering and the subsequent destruction of ballots before an independent review could be performed.

Many said they did not hear the answers they were looking for, but after Hill resident Kate Cassidy said she felt the board should say it made a terrible mistake and apologize, several board members obliged and expressed regret for the way the association handled questions about its elections.

Board member Pat Moran said that he was personally dismayed by what had happened. “[Some on the board] are deeply concerned,” he said. “You have my apology as a board member.”

Moran’s sentiments were echoed by board member Joanne Dhody.

“I also apologize,” she said. “It’s a shame that [the ballots] were thrown out.”

Several other board members, including Ed Berg and Mark Keintz said they believed mistakes had been made but believed that the way to move forward was to repair the rules of election to avoid a future controversy. A committee had been formed earlier in the meeting to address that rewrite (see below for more details on that committee).

Those comments followed several minutes of tough questions, accusations and rebuttals between members of the board and members of the audience, which included Ed Feldman who circulated a petition calling for a new vote and the resignation of Dina Hitchcock, vice president of operations, for her role in the election. Tensions were frequently high, as Feldman was repeatedly gaveled down by association president Tolis Vardakis for speaking out of order.

The election controversy began shortly after the CHCA election for directors at large after it was questioned by past association president Ron Recko and after the Local reported that 65 memberships had been purchased with cash the final night of voting and that 32 of those 65 memberships had come from out of state.

Last week, one of the newly elected board members, Tapan Patel said in a letter the Local that he had purchased “some” of these memberships that night for family and friends. He did not respond to the Local’s subsequent requests for comment on how many he had purchased and whether those family and friends voted for him alone or for a slate of candidates.

Following questions raised by Recko and the Local, both filed written requests for ballot review with the judges of election. Before any subsequent communication, however, the ballots were destroyed 31 days after the April 23 vote as per election guidelines. The ballots were kept with the judges on the instructions of Hitchcock despite election regulations calling for them to be held in the association office for 30 days. Hitchcock said the decision to keep them with the judges was a security decision because, she said, she did not believe that they were safe in the office.

“I feel very strongly about the sanctity of the privacy of the election,” she said, citing “intuition” that keeping the ballots at the office would have been problematic. “ I said [to the judges of election] ‘You should keep [the ballots] at home.’ That intuition was borne out when a board member [Recko] demanded to see the ballot box. If you want to censure me that’s fine …… my point is, my primary concern was for the sanctity of ballot privacy.”

Hitchcock added that she did not ask the judges to destroy the ballots but that she had told them to exercise their own judgment. The judges, in comments to the Local, said they had conducted their own review and had disqualified 25 ballots but added that those 25 disqualified ballots had not been enough to change the outcome of the election.

The destruction of the ballots before an independent review could be conducted seemed to be the most problematic for the residents in attendance who continued to question the call. When board members countered that the judges were the only ones responsible for ballot review according to the association’s bylaws and that destruction of the ballots was commonplace following the 30-day period, several said they weren’t impressed with the answers.

Longtime Chestnut Hill resident Elizabeth Haimes said the destruction of ballots in the face of an investigation was an offense to common sense.

“It’s a felony in law to destroy evidence during an investigation,” she said, noting that the election controversy did not constitute a felony, but that the principal should have applied and the ballots should have been saved. “It is absolutely wrong [to destroy the ballots]. I don’t know how you can defend that.”

“What was done was appalling,” added Mary Sue Welsh, a regular association volunteer and a past contributor to the Local. She said the ballots could have been cut to remove the names and signatures from the voting section so the signatures could have been reviewed without revealing the votes each person cast.

“I’m not sure what can be done now,” Welsh said.

A vote was taken to end the discussion at the close of the meeting and it carried.

Prior to the debate, a motion was made and passed to charge a committee to review election procedures and to draft new ones in an effort to avoid this year’s controversial.

Association president Vardakis proposed a committee that included board members Pam Learned, Bob Rossman, Kathy Pimpinella, Jane Piotrowski, Pat Moran and Chris Padova. Association secretary Kristina Sullivan asked to be added and was.

Former board member Ann Spaeth, whose service with the association dates back to the 1960s, asked to be included on the committee because she had been involved in drafting election procedures for several years and thought she could lend much needed perspective.

As Vardakis began to tell Spaeth that she could serve in an advisory capacity (in other words not have a vote), he was interrupted by Feldman.

“How dare you not put Ann Spaeth on that committee.”

His comment was quickly followed by Haimes, who said Spaeth belonged on the committee.