Petitions to recall Dolores school board President Dee Prock and board member Vangi McCoy have been found sufficient, according to the Montezuma County Clerk and Recorder’s Office.
The petitions were refiled on June 7 after being deemed insufficient by the clerk’s office.
The cure petitions had to have enough valid signatures for each, minus the signatures originally deemed sufficient.
According to Montezuma County Clerk and Recorder Kim Percell, the original petition and cured petition to recall Prock totaled 385 signatures. The original number of entries accepted was 245 of the required 335. The cured petitions contained 140 accepted signatures, for a total of 385.
The petition to recall McCoy totaled 360 signatures. The original number of entries accepted was 213 of the required 335. The cured petitions contained 147 accepted signatures, for a total of 360.
There is now a 15-day period for a protest from the incumbents. “If a protest is filed, we have between 5-10 days to set a hearing,” Percell told The Journal via email on Thursday. “If no protests have been filed after the 15 days, we then set the date for the recall election.”
For the protest, the incumbent must submit a 300-word justification statement to the Percell, the designated election official. Percell would include a 200-word statement from petition proponents on the ballot.
If no protest is filed, Percell must wait five days to for the incumbent to resign before setting an election date. According to Percell, the incumbents may resign any time before successor candidate petitions are due, and the election would be canceled.
“Successor candidate petition formats may be filed ... on the date initial statement of sufficiency/insufficiency is issued,” Percell wrote. “Circulation may begin once the format is approved.”
The original petitions were deemed insufficient on May 16 after Percell’s office validated signatures.
According to Percell, the original petition to recall Prock contained 396 signatures, but only 245 were valid, 90 valid signatures short of the required 335. The original petition to recall McCoy contained 387 signatures, but only 213 signatures were valid, 122 short of the required 335.
The petitions claimed that Prock and McCoy have failed to follow transparency policies and have contributed to a decline in student performance in Dolores School District Re-4A.
The county had until May 16 to verify that the petition signatures were valid and registered voters.
The petition format was approved on March 27, and circulators Lewis and Smith had 60 days – until May 28 – to collect the required 335 signatures. The total of 335 signatures represents 10 percent of the electors residing in the district, according to Percell.
Prock was appointed in 2014 to a four-year term and will be up for re-election in 2019.
McCoy was appointed to the Dolores school board in 2009, and her term will expire in 2019.
