Lambros and Spencer race still up in the air; Court challenge delays count of paper ballots

Goshen — A contested state Supreme Court justice seat is holding up vote counting for all county races, including the yet-to-be-decided 8th District county legislature race between Republican incumbent Dimitrios Lambros and Democrat challenger Noel Spencer. After last week’s election, unofficial results had Spencer with a 37-vote lead. But with absentee and affidavit ballots still to be counted, that race is still a toss-up. The district covers parts of the towns of Warwick and Monroe as well as Tuxedo. Election officials had earlier anticipated a result by Thanksgiving. But with a court challenge of the justice race, it will take longer than that to determine the winner. Susan Bahren, the Democratic elections commissioner, said Wednesday there is a court order stopping the board of elections from counting any absentee or affadavit ballots until returning to court today, Nov. 18. “Hopefully we’ll find out when we’ll be counting” at that court date, Bahren said. “Right now on order to show cause, there is a schedule that says they want us in court on the 18th.” Bahren said Vincent Reda, chairman of the Rockland County Republican Committee, filed the court challenge. “They want to be in all five counties when absentees are counted,” she said of the committee. “Therefore they’ve got a schedule.” Assuming recanvassing isn’t required, vote counting would commence on Nov. 28, eleven days later than originally expected. Reda’s challenge supports Matthew Byrne, a Village of Suffern judge who came in behind Rosenwasser in this 9th judicial district state Supreme Court justice race. Both candidates are Republicans. According to the board of elections, the total number of absentee ballots sent out is 3,466. The number returned is 2,328. Village of Chester Trustee Philip Valastro said there may be contested votes at Camp La Guardia, a 1,001-bed homeless shelter owned by New York City. Valastro sits on the advisory board of the Volunteers of America, which operates the shelter for the New York City Department of Homeless Services. Residents at the shelter may vote if they have lived there for 25 days. Voting materials may be brought to the shelter, but the only group permitted to register voters there is the Coalition for the Homeless. At the time of the October advisory board meeting, about 160 men were registered to vote, with only about a third of those expected to vote, as judged by past elections. The shelter arranges transportation to polls. A 1992 court case, Coalition for the Homeless v. Jensen, established the right of shelter residents to vote. The applications of 240 Camp La Guardia residents ended up being counted, even though only just over 100 appeared in court.