WOMAN WANTS RIGHT TO VOTE ON ROAD DISTRICT

COMMERCE -- About 15 voters in the Commerce precinct received the wrong ballot Tuesday and didn't get to vote on one issue.

And even though the issue was settled with a 114-vote margin, Lula Rhyne of rural Commerce wants her say in whether the Illmo Special Road District should be dissolved.

Tuesday's election showed 707 voters in favor of dissolving the road district while 821 voted against the proposal.

Scott County Clerk Bob Kielhofner said Thursday that he's apologized to most voters involved.

He said there was a mistake in not giving a small number of voters in the Commerce precinct the ballot that contained the road district issue.

Part of the problem is that the road district meanders around from Nash Road to this community eight miles south of Scott City, Kielhofner said. It is sometimes difficult to put people in the right district when voter registration is done in so many places in the county other than the courthouse.

Kielhofner said it is not in his jurisdiction to call a new election. He said the circuit judge would have to do that.

Rhyne said she was working to file a petition with the circuit court to set up another vote on the issue.

It doesn't matter to her that the issue's outcome would still be the same if the 15 voters had received the correct ballots.

"We were denied our right to vote on the issue," Rhyne said. "We're trying to correct the mistake so we can vote on it. Our ancestors died for this right."

Rhyne said she heard on Wednesday that she should have had a chance to vote on the issue. She said she didn't question election judges on Tuesday why the issue was not on her ballot.

Rhyne thinks anyone who didn't get to vote on the issue Tuesday should be able to.

She said she didn't know yet if the paperwork that she intends to file would have to call for a vote by everyone in the district or just those who didn't have the chance on Tuesday.

"I just want the right to vote on it, plain and simple," Rhyne said.