More details on cost of Johnson special election

IOWA CITY - There have been some rumblings about the $75,000 estimate Johnson County Auditor Tom Slockett put on the cost of a special election to fill a vacant seat on the Board of Supervisors.

Slockett has admitted it's a very rough estimate. It's been more than a decade since the last special election to fill a county seat. As he said at a recent meeting, “it's very difficult to predict a hypothetical election in advance.”

There are a lot of variables, like turnout, number of poll workers, number of satellite polling locations.

On Monday, Slockett released a memo on this. You can see it below.

The cost is important because it was a consideration of the three-person committee that chose to appoint someone to the position rather than have a special election. (That decision was overturned by a petition and an election is set for Jan. 19.) 

But it was not their only consideration. At an early meeting, committee members Slockett, Recorder Kim Painter and Treasurer Tom Kriz said that because there was the petition option, choosing an appointment was the only way to give taxpayers a chance to not spend the money on an election. That is, if they chose to have an election, there would be an election. But if they chose an appointment, then if enough residents were interested, a successful petition would force an election.

2009 Election Cost Estimates