HOW WE SEE IT Bill Williams Should Resign From Seat

NORTHWEST ARKANSAS — Benton County Election Commission chairman Bill Williams should resign, both as chairman and member.

He and fellow Democratic member E.J. Miller are openly at odds. Williams never convinced us the airplane trip to Omaha to fetch software was justified or couldn’t have been avoided. The county judge, among others, openly worries about the loss of public confidence in the commission. Election Commission performance, particularly in the length of time to get a vote tally, is poor.

Redistricting is under way.

Then there was Wednesday’s meeting.

There was a problem with the appointment of new member Mike Sevak, a Republican. Sevak took the oath of office before his predecessor had finished histerm. No one believes this was anything but an honest mistake, but the practical effect was that Sevak was not a duly sworn-in member when the commission met Wednesday.

Williams declared Wednesday that the law is the law.

He’s correct. Sevak’s likely election as the new chairman was delayed - for now - when Williams adjourned the meeting almost immediately.

Good for Williams for upholding the law. We’re all for that.

What bothers us is this: The law was the law on Jan. 15.

That’s the day Sevak’s predecessor formally left office.

That was five weeks and four days before Wednesday’s meeting.

Sevak’s lack of standing was a problem Wednesday - and the day before that, the week before that, and the month before that: Thirty-nine days before that meeting, in fact.

There are only two possibilities here. First, Williams didn’t know there was a problem for most of those 39 days, and he didn’t find the problem until he started looking for one. The only other possibility is: Williams knew earlier, but saved that knowledge for Wednesday’s meeting.

There is no third way.

This problem would have been fixed on any day since the middle of last month by a diligent commission chairman acting in good faith.

Williams apparently has simply become too personally attached to being the commission chairman. That’s enough to make him a poor choice to lead the commission responsible for the second-largest vote total in the state, and an absolutely critical county for Arkansas’ two-party system.

The Benton County Election Commission has lost the trust of the public, the Quorum Court and each other.

We’re also troubled by another announcement Williams made at the meeting. He will ask the state’s Office of the Attorney General for guidance on a number of questions.

Among those questions is one about the possible replacement of commissioners by county political party committees after they are appointed. Another is who may call commission meetings. Another concerns possible removal of an election commission chairman.

We wonder if the final draft of this letter will include a request for a shovel, for it certainly appears that Williams is digging himself in. We can only infer, for instance, that the question about possible replacement of a commissioner by county committees stems from a lack of support from his own county committee. The question on removing a chairman seems equally self-interested.

We know there’s no procedure spelled out in state law for removing a county election commissioner. This is not a new problem. We call upon some member - any member - of the Benton County legislative delegation to introduce a bill before the March 7 firing deadline to remedy this.

If no one in Benton County will do it, someone from the Northwest delegation needs to, or at least co-sponsor such a bill brought forward by anyone in the Legislature.

Even if we don’t need to resort to unwilling removal in this case, the lack of any provision for such a change is a gap in the law that’s needed filling for years.