Monday, June 14, 2010
LAST UPDATED: MONDAY JUNE 14, 2010, 5:52 PM
BY MATTHEW VAN DUSEN
THE RECORD
STAFF WRITER
RIDGEFIELD – An election to recall Mayor Anthony Suarez could take place as early as Aug. 17 following a state Superior Court ruling that borough Republicans gathered enough signatures to force an election.
Judge Robert Wilson wrote that Borough Clerk Linda Prina improperly disqualified 104 signatures for technical reasons and that the petitioners gathered more than the number required.
“While some of the signatures may have been validly rejected, the petitioner has nonetheless substantially demonstrated that they obtained the 1,451 to compel a recall election,” Wilson wrote in the decision, which was released on Monday.
Borough Democratic head Stephen Pellino said he would appeal the decision on Tuesday and seek a stay stopping the clock on the recall election. He said the Democrats were not able to present their case at the Friday hearing before Wilson.
Suarez wrote in a statement that he was “disappointed” with the decision and thanked his supporters.
Prina said that she must now serve Suarez, a Democrat, with a certificate that says the recall petition has met state requirements, after which he has five business days to resign or face recall.
The recall election could take place on Aug. 17 or Aug. 24, depending on when he is served with the certificate, Prina added.
The Democratic mayor was arrested last July for allegedly agreeing to accept bribes from a FBI informant posing as a developer. Suarez has protested his innocence and refused calls to step down.
Robert Avery, the attorney who argued the case and also the head of the petition committee, said the recall is a way for “the people of Ridgefield to stand up and defend themselves against political corruption.”
Republicans have been talking about recalling Suarez for almost a year.
Avery, the borough’s Republican head, and several councilmen formed a petition committee and gathered approximately 1,850 signatures, which they submitted to Prina in March. Borough Democrats also filed a lengthy objection to the petition.
Prina ultimately approved only 1,412 of the signatures, short of the required 1,451, or 25 percent of the borough’s registered voters.
Prina rejected some signatures because the signers failed to put a date beside their signatures, while discounting others because the petition circulators forgot to put the date or their names on the sheets, according to Wilson’s order.
One signature was invalidated because the voter died after signing the petition, even though his daughter affirmed that he had signed, Wilson wrote.
Wilson wrote of one contested group of signatures that “the missing elements… are technical errors made in good faith pertaining to ministerial functions and as such are insufficient to deprive the citizens of their right to vote.”
Jesse Wolosky, a Sparta resident who advises recall efforts including Ridgefield’s, said the fault for the improperly rejected signatures lay not with Prina but with the convoluted state law.
Democrats have noted that Suarez is scheduled to go on trial in early September and the verdict will render the election moot.
