Essex council reviews how to improve municipal elections

As part of its regular council meeting Monday night, the Town of Essex reviewed a report presented to them on how the town conducts its municipal elections and ways to improve them. 

The report, written by town clerk Robert Auger, comes five months after Ontario Provincial Police charged Essex Mayor Larry Snively for "procuring" ineligible voters to cast ballots during the town's October 2018 municipal election.  

Some of the issues highlighted include the use of the town's corporate identity — such as logos — during the election period, "stand alone" election sign by-laws and proxy voting.  

Essex Coun. Sherry Bondy, who was the first to raise concerns about irregularities with proxy votes in 2018, said the report is "fantastic" and that it shows the next steps the municipality can take in order to "secure elections" in the town.

"One of the things that our clerk is suggesting, in terms of the proxy voting, is that the proxy forms will not be given to candidates anymore," she said.

"They won't be on our web site. The candidates cannot print them off and hand them out. So, if somebody in our community needs to vote by proxy, they will have to call the clerk's office and tell them. And then, the clerk will fill out some of the proxy form and the person can either go get it or if they can't, it can be mailed to them."

She said this voting process makes it "much more secure" than the one the town experienced in the 2018 municipal election.

Essex Coun. Chris Vander Doelen disagrees, saying the amendments aren't an urgent matter because "there wasn't really anything broken about our election law."

"Our elections are probably the most honest in the world," he said. "So, anyone who claims otherwise, I believe is misleading voters."

He said there aren't a lot of major changes proposed in the report, except for tighter control of election signs during an election period, but says the changes to proxy voting is a good idea and could be useful.

Bondy said the steps the Town of Essex is taking can increase the security of elections throughout Ontario.  

"The OPP have told me that proxy voting has been done this way in the Town of Essex for many years," Bondy said. "So now, we have an opportunity to fix democracy, you know, nationwide if we so choose so."  

"It's a great move forward for democracy in our town and something that is very much needed."

Timelines have been set in the report in which each policy will be reviewed in the coming months.