Joel EngelhardtThe candidates for March 11 election paid filing fees with debit card, not printed check; all mayoral candidates could be wiped out.
Riviera Beach wrongly certified five candidates as qualified to run for City Council, potentially handing two candidates victory without an election, a lawsuit filed Nov. 21 says.
In an unusual twist, one of the three candidates who filed the legal challenge, Mayor Ronnie Felder, used the same method to qualify for the March 11 race and also could be kicked off the ballot.
The allegation is that City Clerk Deborah Hall accepted filing fees by debit card rather than printed check, as required by state statute.
If that’s right, it could knock Felder and his two opponents out of the race for mayor, forcing a separate special election at a later date.
It also could end the five-year run of Douglas Lawson, who has presided over the council as it has juggled city construction projects worth hundreds of millions, proposals for massive new developments to reshape the skyline and a water system rife with failures, shorn of its management and in need of a $400 million treatment plant.
There’s precedent to throw a candidate off the ballot over qualifying failures as recently as this year in Riviera Beach, where the Fourth District Court of Appeal reversed a circuit judge’s finding and removed incumbent Julie Botel from the ballot, handing the election to her challenger, Glen Spiritis.
Botel made the decision to run at the last minute and submitted a cashier’s check to pay her filing fee.
The court ruled that state law requires candidates to pay the qualifying fee with a “properly executed check drawn upon the candidate’s campaign account.”
The new challenge came from Felder, Council Member Tradrick McCoy and District 5 challenger Fercella Davis-Panier. It would disqualify Davis-Panier’s two opponents in District 5, Lawson and Madelene Irving-Mills.
It also would disqualify one of McCoy’s opponents, Joseph Bedford Sr., but leave McCoy running against Bruce Guyton, a former council member.
Only the District 3 race pitting incumbent Shirley Lanier against former council member Cedrick Thomas would be unaffected.
In the mayor’s race, the legal challenge seeks to remove Kendrick Wyly and Kendra Wester from the ballot. They paid the $1,212 mayoral filing fee on Nov. 12 and Nov. 19, respectively.
But Felder, too, paid by debit card. He returned on Nov. 19, the last day to file his qualifying papers, with a $1,212 check written from his campaign account, as required.
However, the check did not clear. On Nov. 25, he attempted to pay the fee by cashier’s check, but the clerk rejected the payment.
The appellate court pointed out in the Botel ruling that state law allowed candidates to cure problems with campaign checks by submitting a cashier’s check but only within 48 hours of qualifying. Felder’s attempt came six days later.
If all three mayoral candidates are not properly qualified, the city would have to call a special election, with a new qualifying round, Hall said.
At issue is whether a debit card payment is the equivalent of a printed check.
State law says they are, in specific circumstances related to campaign expenses.
But not when it comes to paying filing fees, Delray Beach lawyer Dedrick Straghn wrote on behalf of the three challengers — Felder, McCoy and Davis-Panier.
He cited the appellate court’s finding in the Botel case that “the Legislature intended ‘the law to effect a true bright line,’” requiring payment by check.
The five challenged candidates, not named in the lawsuit, have retained Tallahassee elections lawyer Mark Herron, who has asked to intervene on their behalf.
Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Reid Scott has scheduled a preliminary hearing at 8:45 am Dec. 5.
In her response to the lawsuit, Supervisor of Elections Wendy Link asks the judge to decide the case by Dec. 6, when ballots must be finalized. Link responded even though she said in a letter to the judge that she had been served improperly personally by one of the plaintiffs — McCoy.
