Columbus City Council District 1 Republican incumbent Dascal Bunch has officially filed for a recount in the District 1 race in the municipal election, which he lost by one vote.
The recount petition was filed with the Bartholomew County Clerk’s Office at around 3 p.m. Friday and was assigned to Bartholomew County Superior Court 1.
On Nov. 5, Democratic challenger Jerone Wood defeated Bunch in the Republican’s bid for a third term on the city council by one vote, 260 to 259. Wood was one of four Democrats who won city council seats, giving the Democrats their first majority on the council since 1983, election officials said.
Bunch is represented by attorney Scott Andrews for the recount.
“We’re just waiting for one of the judges to accept (the petition),” said Bartholomew County Clerk Jay Phelps said.
Wood previously said he saw Bunch’s decision to file for a recount coming, and he had no plans to seek legal representation in the process.
“I’m OK with him calling for a recall,” Wood said in a previous interview. “It was one vote. He has the option. I’m still humble with the fact there were so many people that voted for me in the first place. However it ends up, this is a new day and I’m just honored about the amount of people who did vote.”
Currently, recounts in Indiana involving electronic voting machines are done by reprinting the vote tallies on the machines and comparing them to the number of signatures in the poll books, Phelps said. Additionally, mail-in paper ballots would be recounted by hand.
The last recount done in a Columbus municipal election was in the 2011 general election, after Republican Frank Jerome defeated Democrat Greg Knoll by two votes, 879 to 877, to win the Columbus City Council District 3 seat, Phelps said.
The results did not change after that recount, Phelps said.
