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Yorkville voters will have to wait a little longer to find out if the only upcoming contested election for alderman is going to end prematurely with one candidate getting the boot.
After hearing arguments for and against Sammy Hall’s nominating petition for Fourth Ward aldermen, the electoral board said it will reconvene at 1 p.m. Monday, Dec. 2, to present its written decision on the objection.
The electoral board, consisting of Mayor John Purcell, City Clerk Jori Behland and Chris Funkhouser, the most senior alderman in City Council, convened on Tuesday, Nov. 26, to consider an objection filed by Hall’s opponent, Lowell “Rusty” Hyett.
Hyett argued in his objection that Hall’s nominating petition did not contain enough signatures and three signatures should be ruled invalid. Hyett said two of those who signed live in outside of the city limits and a third lives outside the ward. Hyett faces his own electoral board hearing on Dec. 2 after Hall filed an objection to Hyett’s nominating petition.
During the electoral board hearing for Hall’s potential candidacy, Hall made two different arguments to defend his case.
In his first point of contention, Hall said that Hyett incorrectly identified the number of signatures needed to qualify for the ballot. Hyett’s objection used the benchmark number of 603 votes, which was also cited by the Yorkville city clerk, because that is how many ballots were cast during the 2023 consolidated election in Ward 4.
According to the State Board of Elections, to qualify for the ballot, a potential candidate must submit signatures of voters living in the district, no less than 5% of the total ballots cast in the district during the last regular election.
Citing figures from the Kendall County website, Hall argued the number of ballots cast in the 2023 consolidated election in Ward 4 was 556 votes.
Behland said the discrepancies between the two numbers is because the 556 figure does not take into account under votes and over votes during that election, meaning residents of that ward who voted in the election but not that specific race.
An over vote is when a ballot is submitted with more than the maximum number of selections allowed. An under vote is when a ballot from that district is submitted but no vote is cast for a single choice. In the 2023 consolidated election for the 4th Ward, there was one over vote and 46 under votes for a total of 603 ballots.
Hall’s second argument was because there are two aldermanic seats per ward, with staggered election cycles between them, the last true vote for the open seat was in 2021, not 2023, which requires him to submit an even lower number of signatures due to that year’s lower ballot total.
City Attorney Kathleen Field Orr, who sat beside the electoral board, said the law states the total votes in the next preceding election in which the district voted as a unit. Orr said this undoubtedly means 2023 is the correct year to base their figures from, not 2021 as Hall argued.
After hearing Hall’s defense, Purcell said they would have to read through the case law documents Hall presented before making any decision.
“The question is, do we need to count the votes from the previous election immediately for any seat in that ward, which is 2023, or do we need to look at the election of 2021, which you say you have court cases that prove your position,” Purcell said during the hearing. “I’m not an attorney. That’s why we have our legal team investigate that.”
After releasing its written verdict, the electoral board will again convene to consider Hall’s objection against Hyett’s nominating petition.
Hall argues that Lowell failed to accurately identify the office he is seeking because he listed “alderman” instead of “alderperson,” which Hall said is the correct legal definition.