MAHONING COUNTY Final tally confirms Vettori victory

There will be no recount.
By DAVID SKOLNICK
VINDICATOR POLITICS WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- Diane Vettori was declared the official winner today of the hotly contested Mahoning County Court race.
The Mahoning County Board of Elections, which has spent this week reviewing ballot result printouts and hand-counting paper provisional ballots, met today to certify the results from the Nov. 5 general election. The board released the certified numbers Thursday to The Vindicator.
On election night, Vettori, a Canfield attorney, led Austintown Township Administrator Michael Dockry by 211 votes, or 0.49 percent.
The board grants an automatic recount for any race decided by 0.50 percent or less.
But after double-checking ballots from the county's electronic voting machines and counting provisional ballots -- which are cast by registered voters whose names aren't listed at the precinct where they vote -- Vettori's margin of victory grew to 0.56 percent, or 243 votes. Therefore, an automatic recount is not required.
"I can breathe for the first time in the past two weeks," said a relieved Vettori.
No recount
Dockry said he would not pay for a recount, which would cost $1,660, or $10 a precinct for 166 precincts that vote in the county court race.
Dockry said he did not expect that the results would change between Election Day and the certification of the ballot, so the outcome did not surprise him.
"There weren't enough votes for it to make a difference," he said. "The machines would have had to make a mistake originally and that didn't happen."
The totals certified today in the county court race have Vettori with 15,030 votes, or 34.82 percent; Dockry with 14,787 votes, or 34.26 percent; and Judge Loren Popio, the incumbent, with 13,349 votes, or 30.92 percent.
Vettori will be sworn-in in the next few weeks and fill the unexpired term through January 2007.
The governor appointed Popio, of Canfield, last year to replace Theresa Dellick, who left the county court bench after being appointed county juvenile court judge. But that was only a temporary appointment, and the seat was up for grabs in the Nov. 5 election.
There are no races or ballot issues that require recounts in the county.
The results of the Poland school five-year, 3.9-mill additional levy were closer after the certification than the original count. The levy failed 3,342 to 3,306, or by 0.54 percent, according to the figures certified today. On election night, the levy lost by 0.82 percent.
skolnick@vindy.com