Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus doesn't like the needling she's been getting since the County Website accidentally doubled the tallys from Tuesday's special election. The Waukesha Freeman is reporting,
Nickolaus responded to a reporter's questions about the error by calling the situation a non-story and pointing out how she has opened up access to voting results every election night, making a conference room at the county office building available to the public and also posting tallies on Waukesha County's Web site.
"If you make a big deal out of it, I might just shut it down," Nickolaus said of increased access to election results.
Oh yeah, that'll show us. Let's see, small story of relatively little importance now elevated to major story when Nickolaus threatens the media. Smart move Kathy. You just made page one. I hope you weren't planning on running for State Assembly if Ann Nischke becomes mayor of Waukesha.
Bob Dreps, a lawyer with LaFollette Godfrey & Kahn who often represents newspapers in open records cases, said neither Nickolaus nor any county clerk could treat The Freeman's or anyone's access to election results differently than all members of the public.
"To retaliate in any way, doing her job, her official duties, based on something you wrote or said, would violate her duties of office," Dreps said.
However, if Nickolaus is not required to post election results on the Internet then she does not have to keep doing it, Dreps said. Still, her office is subject to open records law and its requirements, he said.
Of course, if she doesn't post those numbers live next time, then she'll make page one again and we'll be reminded of this mistake, and oh let's not forget the last one,
In October, Nickolaus' office sent to area newspapers sample ballots for the county executive special election which indicated a vote cast for one of the two candidates. The ballot had been used to test a voting machine, which requires a marked ballot to operate correctly, she said at the time. Nickolaus made clear in October the ballot was mistakenly sent to newspapers and both candidates understood the situation.
