Mount Desert withholds referendum results

MOUNT DESERT – Because of a legal issue that arose on Election Day, and a resulting opinion the town got from Maine Municipal Association, the results of two local non-binding referendum questions will not be released for another week, according to a town official.

The issue arose when a local resident who had voted already by absentee ballot appeared at the polls Tuesday to take part in the local referendums, Selectman Rick Savage said Wednesday. Ballot clerks were unsure how to legally allow a voter to vote both by absentee ballot and in person, Savage said, so they called MMA to find out what to do.

MMA told the town that absentee voters should vote in the referendums through the regular mail, as they did on their statewide ballots, and that the referendum results should not be released until those additional local absentee ballots have been sent out and then returned.

“You cannot release results of the vote because it may sway their decision,” Savage said.

In the nonbinding referendums, residents were asked if Mount Desert should consider developing a plan to control the local deer population and whether the town should change its fiscal year so it runs from July through June of each year.

The referendum questions were printed on separate ballots from the statewide elections, and they were handed out one at a time with each statewide ballot as voters checked in at the polls, according to Town Clerk Kim Parady.

Melissa Packard, director of elections for the state Bureau of Corporations, Elections and Commissions, said Wednesday that it is up to the town to decide how to deal with the results of the local questions because they are not part of the state ballot.

“That was a local issue, so we really don’t have jurisdiction over it,” Packard said.

Parady said selectmen have not discussed the matter as a group and likely will not do so until Wednesday, Nov. 15, when they are expected to meet next.

Savage said the town doesn’t have an official plan on how to address the issue because selectmen haven’t discussed it. He said that, given the extra week of time, he foresees no reason why the board will not be able to release the results on Nov. 15.