Judge says no to runoff elections in Mount Holly

A Superior Court judge will not require Mount Holly to hold a runoff election after finding that a referendum to change nonpartisan municipal elections from May to November did not include a requirement that candidates receive a majority of votes to win.

Sayke Reilley, who placed fourth in a field of nine candidates for three seats, claimed that the old runoff law – which has not been used since 1982 – was never repealed. But the apparent winners — Lew Brown, Chris Banks and Rich DiFolco — argued that runoffs were eliminated when they changed their local elections because the referendum question remained silent.

“I can imagine that people might think that there could be a runoff election because of the long history of having a runoff election from 1954 to 2013,” Judge Harrington said in a rambling ruling that followed a hearing , which lasted parts of four days . “I could imagine they would believe that, but the time to deal with all of this was a while ago.”

Harrington said it was clear that the right to a runoff election was “extinguished” when Mount Holly briefly experimented with partisan voting 11 years ago.

“Although this was not appropriately worded, over time it has been given the sanctity of correctness,” Harrington said of the referendum’s wording.

Mount Holly’s lawyers vigorously defended the validity of the referendum, a position that benefited the incumbents and the township manager, who happens to be the father of one of the councilors who escapes the runoff.

Angelo Genova, one of Reilley’s attorneys, successfully requested a stay of the Harrington ruling pending an appeal.

Brown (1,440), Banks (1,439) and DiFolco (1,339) defeated Reilley (1,168), Paul Kennedy (1,116) and Amanda Jacobsen (1,098). Three other candidates – Casey Carty (828), Bjana Swinson (656) and Jason Fajgier (635) – were at the bottom of the list.