Mr. Enfield goes to City Hall
Nechero seeks hand count; Wall, Butler to be in runoff

Copyright © 2009
Gallup Independent
By Bill Donovan
Staff writer

GALLUP — The city is planning to swear in Mike Enfield today as Gallup’s newest city councilor, but his victory is still being examined.

Bill Nechero, who lost the northside district seat by one vote — 183 to 182 — said Thursday he is petitioning the city clerk’s office for a hand count of the votes in that election.

City Clerk Alfred Abeita said Nechero has six days from the certification — which took place Thursday — to ask for the recount, which will cost him $50 for each of the district’s two precincts.

Nechero said there are at least two ballots that are questionable. In both cases, the ballots are listed as being marked only for the charter amendment question. There were no choices made for council delegate.

“Why would someone go through all that trouble to cast a ballot and not vote for the council race?” Nechero said. “It may end up I received both of the votes or Mike got both of them or maybe we split.”

Another possibility is that only one of these ballots will show a preference for council and that vote would go to Nechero, setting up a runoff in that race as well as the one for the southside district.

The canvassing Thursday also resulted in the city going forward with a runoff election between Emmett Bryan Wall, who received 314 votes in Tuesday’s election and incumbent Pat Butler, who received 276 votes. Steve Seeger, who came in third, received 265 votes.

Abeita has recommended holding the run-off on April 7 but this will have to be approved by the City Council on Tuesday.

Nechero said Thursday he agrees with those people who say that he may have lost because a lot of his hard-core supporters decided that Enfield didn’t have a chance and therefore decided not to vote.

“I kept telling people that it wasn’t over until the fat lady sings and that you have to get out and vote,” he said.

Abeita said that he has 10 days after the petition is filed to do the hand count but he didn’t think it would take that long.