Florida election officials are challenging St. Cloud state Rep. Paula Stark’s account of her efforts to qualify for this year’s elections.
Stark, a two-term Republican, is suing the state to be placed on the ballot for this year’s elections. The state says she didn’t qualify because it didn’t receive her financial disclosure form by the noon deadline on June 12.
State records show that the office received a check and an oath of office from her campaign less than half an hour before the qualifying deadline.
Stark says her treasurer submitted all the required paperwork at the Division of Elections offices in Tallahassee, but a clerk erroneously returned the financial disclosure because of an altercation in the office.
But “five Declarants say that did not happen,” the state wrote in its latest filing on Tuesday.
Stark on Thursday declined to comment because the suit is still pending.
Staff declarations
Florida Bureau of Election Records Chief Erica “Ikay” Reeve wrote in a formal declaration that she asked staff “not to provide courtesy reviews of the items [handed to us] so that all timely submissions could be timestamped before the deadline.”
For that same reason, she wrote, “I instructed them to simply receive and stamp all items even if they happened to notice a deficiency (like an unsigned item).
“In other words, not even facially deficient items would be given back,” Reeve added.
All four clerks handling paperwork at the Tallahassee office on June 12 wrote in declarations, under penalty of perjury, that they only handed back copies of documents that already had been timestamped.
Past deadlines
The state’s filing also says putting Stark on the ballot would disrupt the election and confuse voters.
If Stark isn’t on the ballot, the two Democratic candidates for the seat would have a Universal Primary that would be open to all voters. If she is, the primary would be closed off by party.
And county election offices on Thursday mailed out the primary election’s first batch of ballots for active military and overseas voters.
Stark’s name isn’t on them.
