State Board of Election’s Investigation says Stephens County failed to respond to Open Records Requests

Continuing our coverage from earlier this week, the State Board of Elections released its findings regarding seven complaints involving the Stephens County Elections Office.

According to information obtained by WNEG from the State Board of Elections under the Open Records Act, between November 2020 and January 2021, the Georgia Office of the Secretary of State Investigations Division received multiple complaints regarding the administration of election duties by the Stephens County Elections Office.

The allegations are as follows:

1. Stephens County Chief Registrar Eureka Gober self-reported that her office had yet to enter all 2020 General Election early voter data into Election Net.
2. Stephens County Elections Office did not process two applications for absentee ballots for the 2020 Primary and General Elections.
3. A Stephens County voter did not receive credit for voting during the 2020 General Election.
4. Stephens County Elections Office failed to register three voters in a timely manner, which resulted in one voter not being able to cast a ballot in the 2020 General Election.
5. Stephens County elections staff violated ballot handling, collection, and transportation codes.
6. Stephens County Elections Office did not report the accurate number of mail/electronic absentee ballots to the Georgia GOP during the 2020 General Runoff Election.
7. Stephens County Elections Office failed to respond to open record requests in a timely manner.

According to the investigative findings there was insufficient evidence to prove a Georgia Election Code violation occurred for Allegation number 3 and 6; however, allegations 1, 2, 4, 5, and 7 all provided sufficient evidence to prove a violation occurred.

Allegation 7 alleges that Stephens County Election Office failed to respond to open record requests in a timely manner.

According to the investigative findings, on January 19, 2021, Investigator M. Parrish met with Rebeckah Bennett regarding the Elections Office responding to open record requests. According to Bennett, she submitted multiple open records request to the Stephens County Election Office and the office either did not respond in a timely manner or did not respond at all. Bennett provided copies of two open record request that she did not receive a response from the elections office.

Parrish writes that on March 9, 2021, he met with former Stephens County Deputy Registrar April Roberts to conduct a records review of the Stephens County Election Office.

Roberts provided Parrish with copies of all open records request her office had on file for Bennett. The copies of outstanding open records request provided by Bennett were not included in Robert’s files.

The open records requests in Roberts’ files appeared to all be completed.

Also, on March 9, 2021, Parrish conducted an inspection of the Stephens County Election Office file room. With the exception of the voter registration files and open records request files, all other 2020 election cycle reports were stored in boxes.

These boxes were labeled with the 2020 election date, but the records were not organized in any particular manner. Roberts stated the election staff did not have the time, or resources to properly file and store these records.

Parrish then conducted a follow-up interview with Former Stephens County Chief Registrar Eureka Gober, on March 18, 2021. Parrish asked Gober if she debriefed Roberts on all outstanding open records requests prior to her separation from the election office.

Gober stated Roberts was aware of most of them and she also forwarded emails of outstanding open records requests from Roberts.

On March 18, 2021, Parrish interviewed Roberts again. Roberts reviewed her email and she had no record of the two outstanding open records requests. Parrish then sent Roberts the requests and she stated she would start working on them immediately.

Following the investigation, it was determined that there was sufficient evidence to prove a Georgia Election Code Violation occurred.