Election Board reaches decision quickly

At a short hearing held Wednesday to settle the candidacy protest filed by Clinton School Board incumbent Dr. Floyd Simon Jr. against opponent Amy Hunter, the three-person Custer County Election Board agreed with Simon and ruled that Hunter was ineligible to run as a candidate, voting to have her name stricken from the record. 
Simon had filed an official dispute to Hunter’s declared candidacy for Clinton School Board Seat No. 4, arguing in his affidavit that her mother-in-law’s employment with the school district put Hunter at odds with Oklahoma law. 
In attendance at the hearing were Simon and his counsel, Julie Miller; Hunter and her counsel, Stephen Beam; election board members Steve Millspaugh, Dennis Baxter and Election Board Secretary Ann Brown; Assistant District Attorney Ricky McPhearson, who provided counsel to the board on procedural matters; and several unnamed persons who were on hand to be witnesses if needed. 
After a swearing-in, Simon was called upon first to give his testimony. He began by reading aloud the specific section in the Oklahoma Statutes he was using as the basis for his dispute. 
“The facts in my dispute are that Title 70 of Oklahoma Statute, Section 5-113, prohibits anyone from being eligible to be a candidate for or serving on a board of education if the person is currently employed by the school district governed by that board of education or is related within the second degree by affinity or consanguinity to any other member of the board of education or to any employee of the school district governed by the board of education.”
He cited several Oklahoma court case rulings that he said supported his argument.
Simon summarized with, “So the issue is that my opponent’s candidacy should be stricken from the record, since she isn’t eligible to run.”
Hunter’s attorney spoke next, saying that they basically agreed with the facts presented by Simon. He cited  the same court cases presented by Simon, but said his interpretation of them was different. 
The basis of Beam’s argument was that the issue should be service, not candidacy.
“The purpose of the statute is that you obviously shouldn’t be able to serve on the school board with your wife or your husband, or your mother or your father, that sort of thing,” said Beam. “We can all agree with that. But in our case, Amy’s mother-in-law is going to resign effective immediately.” 
Baxter then asked if the mother-in-law had already resigned, to which Beam answered, “It’s my understanding that she’s going to resign immediately. We talked to her today and she said she’s going to resign immediately, so that when service comes up there will be no conflict. 
“And the purpose of the statute is service, not candidacy,” he repeated.
Millspaugh then asked Beam, “Knowing all this, why hasn’t the mother-in-law resigned? If she had, all this would be moot… It’s hard for me to understand why she hasn’t resigned.” 
Beam repeated that the mother-in-law was in the process of resigning immediately, but as of 1:30 p.m. that day (the scheduled start time for the hearing) had not yet done so.
When Simon was allowed to give a rebuttal, he referred board members to the final page of the candidate filing packets both he and Hunter had completed when filing their candidacy at the election board office. 
“At the bottom of the page right before the signature line it says, ‘By signing below, I am indicating that I am eligible to be a candidate for member of the board of education and, if elected, to serve in such office.’
“Part of that is, you’re saying that the statements are true at that time,” said Simon. “If that was the case at that time, it would make her ineligible as a candidate.”
Board members then called for a closed-door recess, so that they could deliberate before making their decision. 
When they returned approximately 10 minutes later, they were in session for less than a minute before ending the meeting. 
Millspaugh announced the board had reached a decision and called on Baxter to make the motion. 
At that point Baxter said, “I move that Amy Hunter’s name be stricken from the ballot.” The motion was seconded by Brown and the board members voted unanimously to approve the motion, followed quickly by a vote to adjourn the meeting.