Wednesday, October 24, 2001
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Wednesday, October 24, 2001 |
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Changes afoot for next year's elections Candidates in the 2002 election will face a hurried-up campaign period, thanks to redistricting. Because of the time involved in getting federal approval of the state's new district lines for both state and federal offices, the qualifying period has been moved up from April to June, reported Fayette County Commission Chairman Greg Dunn. Under the provisions of a bill approved during the recent special session of the Legislature, the 2002 General Primary Election will be Tuesday, Aug. 20.Candidate qualifying begins at 9 a.m. Wednesday, June 19, and concludes Friday, June 21 at noon. A runoff, if necessary, would be Tuesday, Sept. 10. To be eligible to vote in the General Primary Election, citizens must be registered to vote no later than the close of business Monday, July 22. As with any change in Georgia election law, these changes must be "pre-cleared" by the United States Department of Justice before they can take full effect in law.Official election calendars for 2002 will not be revised until the pre-clearance process is concluded. Under previous law the primary would have been July 16 with a runoff date of Aug. 6.The date change provisions only apply to primary elections in the year following the reapportionment of legislative and congressional districts. Under the bill the 2004 General Primary date will revert to the third Tuesday in July, and candidate qualifying will begin the fourth Monday in April. Another change local voters will encounter, Dunn said following a recent meeting of the Association of County Commissioners of Georgia, will be new voting machines, to be paid for by the state. According to Secretary of State Cathy Cox, Georgia's record in the 2000 elections was worse than Florida's, with 94,000 votes not counted due to problems with voting machines.
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