Kevin Canfield
Tulsa World Staff Writer
Tulsa County officials confirmed on Tuesday that this week’s city election recounts will not be held at the county Election Board office, 555 N. Denver Ave.
They instead will take place at the site of the Election Board’s future home, 12000 E. Skelly Drive. Citing concerns about the age, condition and size of the current Election Board building, the county bought the new property in January 2023 and has plans to move into it sometime after the November elections.
Mayoral candidate Brent VanNorman and District 3 City Council candidate Susan Frederick have filed paperwork with the Election Board seeking recounts. A second City Council candidate, Angela Chambers, filed paperwork alleging voting irregularities in her District 1 election.
“The resources needed — they’re at the new facility,” Board of County Commissioners Chairman Stan Sallee said during Tuesday’s commission meeting.
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“So we’re going to make the building work, and it’s going to be awesome to see that happen, and lots of security.”
The recounts are expected to begin on Thursday after a 9 a.m. hearing before Tulsa County District Court Presiding Judge Dawn Moody.
According to state law, once the court determines that the ballots have been properly preserved, “then the recount of the ballots shall be conducted immediately thereafter under the exclusive supervision of the county election board.”
VanNorman
VanNorman found himself the odd man out on election day when he finished in third place, 438 votes behind second-place finisher Karen Keith and 710 votes behind Monroe Nichols. Keith and Nichols are set to meet in a runoff on Nov. 5.
Those margins have changed a bit after provisional ballots were tallied. VanNorman now trails Keith by 436 votes and Nichols by 728 votes.
The total vote count for the mayoral election stands at 56,651, up from the election day figure of 56,585, according to final unofficial results from the county Election Board. The latest figures include provisional ballots that were cast and counted.
Nichols remains the top vote-getter with 18,763, followed by Keith at 18,471 and VanNorman at 18,035.
In announcing his decision to seek a recount, VanNorman said that given the close nature of the race, the recount was justified and necessary.
“This decision isn’t about challenging the process but about reinforcing confidence in it,” VanNorman said. “We trust in the process, and we want to verify the results to ensure full confidence in this election.”
It comes at a large expense for VanNorman’s campaign and for the public. The county Election Board charged VanNorman $12,000 for the recount based on a pre-set cost schedule tied to the number of votes cast.
The Election Board estimates that it will spend $12,000 a day conducting the manual recount. It is expected to take two to three days — or more — to complete.
In the District 3 race, Frederick finished with 1,109 votes on election day, behind Jackie Dutton, who earned 1,295 votes.
Frederick said one of the reasons she decided to request a recount is because the lists of potential voters she was provided by individuals who assisted in her campaign — not by anyone connected to the Tulsa County Election Board — often led her to boarded up houses or to individuals whose names did not match the names on her list.
“There was a lot of discrepancies with the list that I had, and I am thinking, ‘Are these people actually voting?’” Frederick said.
Chambers filed paperwork with the county Election Board alleging “irregularities other than fraud.” Her opponent in the District 1 election was incumbent Councilor Vanessa Hall-Harper.
In her petition — supported by three affidavits from voters — she alleges that multiple people who were encouraging people to vote for Hall-Harper were “present in the voting area during election hours” at Vernon AME Church, a polling place in District 1.
Hall-Harper won 3,142 votes, or 66.9% of the total votes cast, to Chambers’ 1,552 votes, according to the unofficial final results from the Election Board.
Under state law, when alleging irregularities other than fraud, the petitioner must prove “that it is impossible to determine with mathematical certainty which candidate is entitled to be certified as the party’s nominee or to be issued a certificate of election.”
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