Commission winner is
center of elections board probe

• Nakina Rescue Squad worker alleges that County Commissioner winner Ronald Gene Gore “harassed” and “threatened” her about placement of tent outside Nakina polls on Election Day.

By BOB HIGH
Staff Writer

A controversy at Nakina on Election Day will be addressed by the board of elections during the week of Nov. 27, reports Board Chairman Jesse Graham.

Among complaints made to the board Monday night is a report that County Commissioner-elect Ronald Gene Gore and his brother Jerry, both of Nakina, harassed and threatened a Nakina Rescue Squad member over the placement of a tent at the squad’s building being used as the community’s polling place on Nov. 7.

“I didn’t do anything wrong. Everyone who heard the entire incident knows I did nothing wrong, and I’ll be satisfied with whatever the board of elections determines,” Ronald Gene Gore said Wednesday afternoon.

“I can’t say with any certainty it affected any of the votes that day. It might have affected some, but not enough to have made a change in the outcome,” Gore’s Republican challenger Sammy Hinson said late Wednesday.

Gore defeated Hinson 1,299 to 975, a spread of 324 votes.

“What happened that day can’t be allowed to continue. Something has to be done,” Hinson added.

Harassment

Debra Long Ward, a Nakina rescue worker, complained to the elections board about what she termed “harassment” and “being threatened” while she was on duty at the squad building at 7 a.m. on Nov. 7.

Ward told the board she made a phone call to Carla Strickland, director of elections, “to make sure, not to complain” about the placement of a tent near the rescue building.

“Carla asked me to take the phone outside to Ronald and she told him there was a problem with where he had placed the tent,” Ward said.

“Ronald came into the rescue squad office and confronted me. He assumed I complained about the tent. All I did was to check to see if there was a problem. He told me several times he would remember this, and he was getting very loud,” Ward added.

“A Democrat (election) judge came into the room and told him to calm down. I went outside and one of Ronald’s supporters argued with me and made derogatory remarks about me,” the rescue squad member continued.

“I don’t do the measurements from the building. Some officials did it, and the yellow tape (marking the boundary) was moved later further from the building,” she said.

Negative phone calls

Ward added that Ronald Gore’s brother Jerry came to the precinct a short time later and went to the rescue squad office and asked to speak privately to her. Jerry Gore complained about the measurements, then told Ward he was upset about reports that rescue squad members were making negative phone calls about Ronald Gore’s candidacy.

Ward said she didn’t appreciate being harassed on her job site. “The county pays me as a member of this rescue squad and now Ronald Gore will be part of the decision making to pay me, so I’m still upset.”

Ronald Gore said he placed the tent on the grass near the building – but outside the area marked with yellow tape – because of the rain. “Rex Gore’s mother, Ron Stanley, Mrs. Boyd Register and I were under the tent.

“Debra Ward came out of the building with a phone and handed it to me. It was Carla (Strickland) at the board of elections. She told me a complaint had been made about the tent being too close to the building, and I would have to move it,” the commissioner-elect said.

“I told her I was outside the yellow tape, and told her I was 10 to 15 feet from the building, but outside the tape. She told me I had to ask the rescue squad people if I could leave the tent where it was located.

“I went in the building, gave the phone back to Debra and asked permission. She told me she couldn’t give me permission. She told me that Jesse Graham said the tent was in violation,” Gore continued.

Denies harassment

Gore said he told her he would remember this fact and find out before the next election where the tent could be placed. “I took the tent down and put it in my private vehicle.

“I didn’t harass her nor did I threaten her,” Gore declared.

Jerry Gore said he told Ward that his father was the first person who gave money to establish the Nakina Rescue Squad. “I told her I didn’t appreciate the complaint about my brother putting up the tent.”

Jerry said the conversation became a “little heated,” but he didn’t raise his voice. “It was upsetting to me that I was told some rescue squad members were calling David Dutton (the current commissioner) and asking who they should vote for. I didn’t appreciate it,” Jerry Gore added.

Jerry M. Fowler, chairman of the county’s Republican party, said he presented the Nakina complaint, along with some others, to the board Monday evening, Nov. 13.

Fowler complained to the board about an incident at the Pireway polling place in the Riverside Baptist Church where a woman working for Sammy Hinson was “spit on, swung at and cursed” by a man who told the woman she had no business there because, “This is Gore country.”

Fowler said an incident in Tabor City involved too many Democrats being official poll workers. “There was supposed to be four Democrat workers, and there were eight. The board of elections gave them permission to have that many, from what I’ve been told,” Fowler declared.

The GOP chairman also noted a problem at the precinct where an assigned Republican poll worker was not allowed by the Democrat judge to work that day. “She was reluctantly allowed to stay inside the polling place,” Fowler asserted.