Troy

Troy mayor will face recall

By Terry Oparka
C & G Staff Writer

Voters in Troy will decide if Mayor Janice Daniels will retain her office after county election officials confirmed there were enough valid signatures to put the issue on the November ballot.

With a mere 10 minutes to spare, Daniels formally challenged signatures on petitions asking for her recall at 4:20 p.m. July 12.

Daniels had until 4:30 p.m. that day to challenge the signatures based on validity of signature and voter registration — 7,985 valid signatures were needed for the matter to be put to voters in November.

Joe Rozell, director of elections for Oakland County, said that upon initial review of the challenge, some of the signatures included in the challenge had already been disqualified and had not been included in the initial count.

Rozell also said that Daniels was asserting that someone other than the person who signed the petition wrote the date on the document later in some cases.

“We have not found any petitions where a single individual wrote the date,” Rozell said. “We’ve not encountered anything like that.”

He said Daniels’ challenge to petitions where the signer had put information in the wrong place, such as the date of birth line, and not initialed it, are not challengeable under state statute.

In a July 16 letter to Matt Binkowski, treasurer of the political action committee Recall Janice Daniels, dated July 16, Rozell states the petitions contained 8,877 valid signatures. Daniels and the Troy City Clerk’s Office were also notified.

The Oakland County Elections office verified 8,882 signatures on the petitions June 28.

The language states that Daniels should be recalled for:

• Referring to the Troy City Charter as a “whimsical” document.

• Declaring during an office hours forum that the homosexual lifestyle is dangerous.

• Publicly attacking city employees during a meeting while reading a 20 minute position paper into the record.

• Failing to support a more than $8.4 million federal investment in the city by voting against a proposed transit center on three occasions.

Binkowski said nearly 9,300 signatures were submitted to the Oakland County Elections Division June 12. A total of 14,832 voters cast ballots in the 2011 Troy Mayoral election — 7,709 for Daniels and 7,094 for Council member Robin Beltramini.

Binkowski said the committee conducted a thorough internal validation process before the signatures were submitted.

In a press release dated July 16, the Recall Janice Daniels committee said the recall effort would move to the next phase: raising the funds necessary to educate the public about “the failures of Janice Daniels and her dangerous ideas.”

Further, it states: “The recall campaign looks forward to the November ballot, when responsible leadership will be restored to the city of Troy.”

“I have an obligation to my many supporters to challenge this unwarranted political attack,” Daniels said. “I think I am a wonderful mayor, and I just need to get that message out in spite of a partisan, unsupportive media.” She noted that she includes the Troy Times in that statement.

On her website, www.janice formayor.com the Committee to Elect Janice Daniels accepts donations to fight the recall effort.

The mayoral recall question will appear on the presidential ballot Nov. 6. Nearly 79 percent of Troy voters turned out in the 2008 presidential election, compared with 26 percent turnout in the 2011 mayoral election.
 

You can reach C & G Staff Writer Terry Oparka at toparka@candgnews.com or at (586)498-1054.