By Terry Witt – Spotlight Senior Reporter

            In an era when elections are increasingly complex and Levy County cities often have inexperienced clerks or city managers running the elections, Supervisor of Elections Tammy Jones won a commitment from the Williston City Council this week to change its election date from March to April.

            Jones provides support to cities for their elections and loans municipalities election voting machines that scan paper ballots and count the vote, but in the past, the county’s eight cities all had separate election days scattered throughout the year creating challenges for Jones and her staff.

            “Having city elections throughout the whole entire year over the past 28 years has become cumbersome with new city clerks and new city managers, and I want to help and I will help but it’s become a challenge,” Jones said. “I do think it’s a benefit to the voters because there will be less confusion. We can get the message out that all the municipalities in the county have elections the same day. It ensures we have the support for you for each city if we have elections on the same day. Also, it unifies the cities with a timeline.”

            The first week in April will be Unified Municipal Election Day. She said every city would have the same qualifying dates and the same lead time leading to the election to avoid voter confusion.

            Jones said election rules are complicated, especially now with the federal and state governments constantly changing the rules and requirements for holding elections.

            The cities of Bronson, Chiefland, Cedar Key, and Otter Creek have changed their election day to the first Tuesday in April at the request of Jones. Williston, which initially turned a cold shoulder to Jones’s request, will be the fifth of eight cities in Levy County to agree to the change, leaving Yankeetown, Inglis, and Fanning Springs with their old election dates. Jones plans to send copies of Chiefland and Cedar Key’s ordinances for elections to City Attorney Kiersten Ballou. She will write a new elections ordinance for Williston.

            “I’m not as concerned about Fanning Springs and Yankeetown. They do not use our equipment. It’s not as big a concern for me,” Jones said. Those two cities simply deposit paper ballots in boxes rather than using computerized voting machines to count the vote.

            Jones said Williston ran into problems this year with the mail-in ballots deadline. She handed council members a green sheet showing what happened.

            “You can see Jan. 15 was the mail date to count the ballots. Guess when qualifying ended – the day before, Jan. 14. We missed the mark. When I say we, I mean we the city; that’s a bad thing. We don’t want to hurt our military and other people by missing the mark and getting it out by the deadline,” Jones said. “I’m not saying it’s a legal thing that’s wrong. I’m not saying legally you’ve done anything wrong, but I think we need to do due diligence for our military and people that serve overseas.”

            Jones said she doesn’t want the council to worry that moving the election day could be harmful.

            “I’m going to have plenty of staff trained to be there by phone or in-person wherever needed, so I don’t want you to think any assistance won’t be provided because we have multiple cities that we would juggle,” Jones said.

            Council President Debra Jones said it would have been difficult to switch election dates in time for the March 1, 2022 election, but she said the city has the time for the next election, “so this is the time to do it.”

            Mayor Charles Goodman said one of his concerns is the possibility that having all the municipal elections on one day will spread Jones’ office thin on Election Day. Jones said she plans to provide additional canvassing board training and more advanced training to clerks and city managers ahead of next year’s elections.

            “I don’t know if you know this, but before I was elected, the elections office did not attend. We were not here election night. I have provided that service. We provide the equipment. That’s really why I’m here, but I actually provide more service than just equipment,” Tammy Jones said.

            If the city had continued to use its standard March election date, Debra Jones said the city would have wound up in conflict with the Presidential Primary in March.

            Tammy Jones said she has borrowed voting equipment from other counties in the past but won’t do it again. She said her office has ample equipment to provide voting machines to all 13 precincts on major election days such as the one coming up in November.

            “I don’t want to ask another county to borrow their equipment. I think it’s inappropriate,” Tammy Jones said. “I’ve done that in the past to make sure Williston had equipment and Inglis had equipment, but I’m not going to take possession of another county’s equipment. I know it’s safe when you’re dealing with election people but the public perception, that would not be good.”

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City of Williston Regular Meeting April 19, 2022; Posted April 24, 2022