Mahoning County Board of Elections calls for action from Commissioners regarding election standards

YOUNGSTOWN The Mahoning County Board of Elections is calling for action from the Mahoning County Board of Commissioners regarding election standards following the passing of a crucial deadline.

Back in May, the Ohio Secretary of State's Office ordered Boards of Elections in all Ohio counties to send a series of directives to show how they were properly securing their election equipment.

If those guidelines were not met, non-compliant boards had until August 29 to get any issues rectified.

Now, that deadline has come and gone and Mahoning County Board of Elections Chairman Dave Betras tells 21 News the Board is still not in compliance with these guidelines.

"[The guidelines] want fire alarms, they want [voting machines] monitored, they want them secured [and] limited access. None of that is happening here," Betras said. "I have brought this to the county commissioner's attention. I don't know what else to do, it's getting to the point where we're going to have to sue them to have a resolution to this because we have an obligation to fulfill those Secretary of State requirements and they have not provided us a building yet," he said. 

Betras says he's been speaking with the Mahoning County Board of Commissioners regarding the acquisition of a new building to meet these requirements for quite some time, but there has been no progress.

"I want them to do their job and to provide us a building, and they've done nothing. They want to study it more. They've been studying it for three years, and we're losing our patience with their studying," Betras said.

Betras went even further on Facebook, calling commissioners liars in a post that reads, "Just so everyone understands your elections are not safe and secure anymore because we're out of compliance with what the Secretary of State has mandated and Mr. Defabio promised the voters he would deal with this issue. He lied, he's a liar and so is Anthony Traficanti. Everyone should remember this when you go to vote next time."

21 News has reached out to the Mahoning County Board of Commissioners for comment on the status of this study, but it was not addressed.

Carol Rimedio-Righetti acknowledged the need to act, "I know they need a building, I know they need to move, I know they want to move, we're trying to get things stable for now until we see where we can move them. We have the tax issue on the ballot and hopefully that wont pass but it probably will and if state and senate wont step up to solve the property tax issue, we really need to handle things in that respect before we go out and try to deal with things in buildings and finances. If that passes that's $44-$54 million dollars out of the budget gone," she said. 

Commissioners Defabio and Traficanti declined to comment.

We've also reached out to the Ohio Secretary of State's Office to find out what the current situation means for Election Day in Mahoning County. We were told the office was looking into the matter, but had no comment at this time.