The court-ordered recount of disputed ballots in Kitchener's ward nine council race will take place next Thursday, Jan. 13.
On Dec. 30, a superior court judge ordered a third count of some of the ballots cast in the tight race between Debbie Chapman and Frank Etherington.
Chapman, who lost the council seat by one vote will be present, along with her competitor.
Only the forty disputed ballots, called ‘overvotes,' on which voter intentions weren't clear will be examined.
Those votes weren't counted towards the initial results, or in the first electronic recount of the ballots.
Randy Gosse, the city clerk for Kitchener, says "Myself, along with the two candidates and their representatives, we will go into another room, we will look at those forty ballots and they will decide whether they have any disputes with any of those ballots and then if they do have disputes, I, as the clerk under the Act, I make the determination on those disputes."
Chapman had petitioned the court for a manual recount, and she now hopes the process will lead to improvements in the Municipal Election Act, which predates the use of electronic vote counters.
Whether or not the results of the election change, it's possible that this recount may still not end the dispute in ward nine.
If the candidates don't agree with the clerk's decision about any of the disputed ballots, either one has 15 days to apply to the court to have a judge look only at those ballots and make the final determination.
