Elections Administrator Under Fire

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March 30, 2005

Elections Administrator Under Fire

Just before my withdrawal symptoms got really out of control, I found Chattanoogan.com to be back online. The lead story is one that I have been trying to track for weeks, without much success.

One question, among many, that I have recently asked myself is: Is Ms. Dzik about to "pull a Curtis Adams?" We know that she is a former Hamilton County Democratic Party chair, but she seems awfully friendly with Republicans these days. (Scroll down linked page.) Election Commissioner Mike Walden (R) has nothing but praise for her, yet Democrats on the Commission almost voted her out, according to the Chattanoogan article. At the least, she will be unable to make personnel changes in the Election Commission office until new Commissioners are selected next week by the General Assembly.

The reported reasons for all this fuss have to do with Election Commissioner Linda Johnson, who is on the Commission in spite of also being employed by a state senator, and whose daughter (Laura Woods) is employed by the Election Commission office (i.e., she works for Fran Dzik). (That sounds like at least one conflict of interest to me, but I tend to err on the side of über-propriety.) Fran Dzik reprimanded Ms. Woods over alleged internet misuse, and some say that Ms. Johnson is engaging in personal punitive measures by these recent actions against Ms. Dzik.

However -- and you heard it here first -- what gets my curiosity standing on end is the fact that someone has been "googling" the terms [fran dzik 2005] and [fran dzik march 2005] in recent days, from a computer hosted on a uscourts.gov gateway. (I know this because they've landed on this blog several times.) Perhaps this is merely a bored federal court employee who is herself dallying in a little personal internet activity on the job; but it is more likely that someone has been assigned some research. We know that there was litigious activity following the 2000 and 2002 election cycles that involved the Election Commission; but why the search terms [march 2005]?

Stay tuned to this one.

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