A recount has been ordered to decide the outcome of a contested write-in election for the Lyons-Brookfield School District 103 Board of Education.
For months, Robert Jonak waited for his opportunity to overturn the write-in election of Lyons-Brookfield School Dist. 103 board member Humberto Andrade. The Lyons resident moved one step closer to accomplishing just that when Cook County Circuit Court Judge Marsha D. Hayes ordered an Aug. 10 recount of the April election results.
“This is exactly what we wanted,” said Lawrence Zdarsky, Jonak’s attorney. “We wanted to get a true and fair count.”
Jonak filed a lawsuit seeking a recount of the write-in votes in 24 precincts in Dist. 103 after allegedly witnessing numerous irregularities and outright mistakes by election judges.
Andrade was declared the winner of the vacant 4-year seat on the Dist. 103 board after polls showed he received 146 votes to Jonak’s 93. On May 23, Jonak filed suit contesting the election, including sworn affidavits from 23 voters in two precincts where no votes were tallied for either write-in candidate.
Jonak also alleges that polling places lacked pens for writing in votes and that some election judges didn’t even realize that there were write-in candidates until the end of the day.
“By our count, we feel there were at least six precincts that didn’t count write-in votes,” Zdarsky said. “The quickest way to find out what the true outcome is would be to have a recount. And that will finally happen in a couple weeks.”
The recount will take place at the Cook County Clerk’s Office at 9 a.m.
“We want the truth, too,” said Judith Petrucci, Andrade’s attorney. “If votes were not counted, we want them to be counted.”
Both Zdarsky and Petrucci agreed the recount should be enough to lay the issue to rest.
“As long as there are no arguments regarding the recount, this issue should be solved on Aug. 10,” Zdarsky said. “There should be a clear-cut winner.”
