By NICOLE CARTRETTE
Staff Writer

Just five people showed for a regular scheduled Columbus County Board of Elections meeting Monday night, in which election complaints related to the South Williams polling site located at the Tabor City Courthouse were discussed.

Board Chairman Jessie Graham announced that a formal hearing would be held giving all parties involved and those accused an opportunity to respond to allegations of violating election laws.

Defeated Columbus County Commissioner candidate for District 5, Barry Worley, told the board that things Doris Strickland of Tabor City filed a formal election complaint prior to the meeting that she subsequently read to the board when she was given the opportunity to speak.

Attached to her complaint is an affidavit in which she alleges campaign materials (fans for Barry Worley) were taken into the voting enclosure by county-hired poll workers. Strickland claims it is a violation of NCGS 163-166.4 to have a political advertisement inside the voting enclosure.

That statute states, in part, that “No person or group of persons shall render access, harass others, distribute campaign literature, place political advertising, solicit votes, or otherwise engage in election-related activity in the voting place or in a buffer zone which shall be prescribed by the county board of elections around the voting place.”

Doris Strickland also claims that during One Stop, early voting at the site on April 24 and May 8 that “individuals were giving voters a piece of paper that substantially resembled an official ballot.”

“I personally saw one of these papers and it did not have written on its face a prominent statement that the document given to the voters was not produced by a board of elections and is not an official ballot,” Strickland writes in her complaint. “This is a violation of NCGS 163-165.2 (b).

That law states, n part that “no person other than a board of elections shall produce or disseminate a document substantially resembling an official ballot unless the document contains on its face a prominent statement that the document was not produced by a board of elections and is not an official ballot.

She also goes on to alleged and name four individuals that she says sought to “persuade or induce voters to cast their vote in a particular way” by giving them “the white piece of paper that resembled an official ballot.”

The law allows for assistance and under certain circumstances voters with a physical disability and need assistance to the booth or assistance marking the ballot due to a physical disability, illiteracy or blindness. Under that law, the voter has the right to choose who assists them with a statement of the reason given to the chief judge.

Among other things, the law states, “the person rendering assistance shall not in any manner seek to persuade or induce any voter to cast any vote in any particular way.”

Strickland also alleges and names an individual that she claims she heard tell county commissioner candidate Barry Worley how three voters cast their vote in the District 5 commissioner race.

Strickland writes that she saw the chief Judge of the precinct, Kathy Wooster, tell a campaign worker on three occasions to leave the passenger side of a vehicle in the buffer zone. She claims that the campaign worker is in violation of the law by having campaign literature inside the buffer zone.