Misfile leads to write-in campaign

The Kootenai County Clerk's Office and a Mica Kidd Island resident disagree on how his initial candidacy paperwork for fire district commissioner was misfiled.

Regardless who is right, the deadline to put his name on a ballot is passed, so Chris Shelton must now run as a write-in candidate.

"I'm not pissed about it," he said. "It just makes my life more difficult."

Shelton, vying for the sub district 2 commissioner seat of the Mica Kidd Island Fire Protection District, acknowledged that he misread the directions on his Declaration of Candidacy form.

Instead of turning it in to the fire district clerk, he brought it to the county clerk's office, he said, three days before the filing deadline on Sept. 9.

"I'm just a rookie," Shelton admitted. "This is my first time running for any office whatsoever in my life."

But no one told him he was wrong when he handed over the paperwork at the county office, he said.

"I turned it in to the secretary," he said. "She said to me she was new, and didn't know quite what to do with it. I said, 'I don't know, I'm just turning it in.'"

Shelton was puzzled that weekend when he read in The Press that no one had filed to run for the open seat.

He contacted the clerk's office, and was told a different version of events.

Clerk Cliff Hayes said that staff insists that Shelton's paperwork had just been left on the office counter at the end of Friday.

No conversation had taken place, he was told, between Shelton and county staff.

"I can't get to the bottom of it," Hayes said, acknowledging that Shelton has said he was out of town on Friday.

No matter when the paperwork was submitted, Hayes added, it should have gone to the fire district clerk.

"They (district offices) confirm that, and they forward the application or the Declaration of Candidacy to our office," Hayes said.

Hayes and Shelton have agreed the 59-year-old should campaign as a write-in candidate, which has a filing deadline at 5 p.m. today. This means voters must pencil in Shelton's name on the ballot to put him in office.

Shelton doesn't mind. Folks in the region know him from his past involvement with the local homeowners' association, he said.

Shelton, a project manager at Polin and Young Construction, has even heard some encouragement from the community to run for the seat left open by Brian de Garmeaux, who is not running for re-election.

But he is still disappointed by the situation, he said.

"I said to Cliff, 'It's fire district commissioner, it's not that big a deal,'" he said. "But what if this was for something more substantial, and there were more people filed as candidates? This could be a problem."

Hayes said his office is doing the best it can.

"This is the first time the Elections Office has had to handle every election in Kootenai County, and I'm not going to do it perfect," he said.

Shelton has already filed as a write-in candidate, he said - this time, at the right office.

"I got it right the second time," he said.