New EA focuses on primary

Published Thursday, February 6, 2008

By Brandon Evans

One week after the first Wise County elections administrator quit, county commissioners met with the new elections administrator, Lannie Noble.

Glen Moore, the county's first elections administrator, submitted a letter of resignation on Jan. 25. Moore's first day with the county was Dec. 1, 2007. After receiving the letter, Wise County Judge Bill McElhaney and the rest of the county elections commission started seeking a replacement.

"We met three times last week to find and appoint a new elections administrator," McElhaney said.

Moore quit only one month before early voting in the March primary begins. The timing caused the elections committee to act quickly on finding a replacement.

The committee named Noble to the post on Friday. Noble, former deputy voter registrar for the county, was one of six applicants who initially applied for the elections administrator position last fall. The office handles the entire elections process in the county. Prior to this year, the county clerk's office had handled elections.

Noble has worked for the county for five years. The last three he has worked in voter registration.

"We believe Lannie will do a fine job," said Monte Shaw, county tax assessor/collector and member of the county elections commission, the group charged with appointing, replacing and removing the elections administrator. "He is the right person to pick this up."

"It's going to be a challenge," Noble said, "but it's not anything the county can't overcome."

In a couple of visits to the commissioners court and in his letter of resignation, Moore indicated displeasure at the current office space provided for his department.

A section of Moore's resignation letter reads, "...the present office location in the county clerk's basement is entirely unsuitable for the proper conduct of business, due to it's small space... The present location is an impediment to the efficient conduct of the elections business of the people of Wise County..."

The office is located in the lower level of the Records Building.

Despite the office space, Noble said they have to make it work because it is too late to shift locations so close to an election.

"In a perfect world, we would have a larger building," Noble said. "But we can make this work."

Noble said he believes the county will address the office issue after the primary election.

Dan Teed, the deputy elections administrator, said the current focus is on the election.

"Some of the machinery in here is very difficult to move," Teed said. "We need more time to move everything out of here. With the election coming up, it's just not feasible to do it right now."

In preparing for the March primary, Noble said his top priorities at this point are testing all the machinery, maintaining a current and complete voter database and working with the party chairs to ensure adequate staffing during the election.

Noble said he became interested in the position of elections administrator due to years of working in voter registration.

"In voter registration I got to work with elections," Noble said. "I got to see Sherry's (Parker-Lemon) love for the election process. It inspired me, and I thought I would try to expand my knowledge and try to build on what Sherry did."

As county clerk, Parker-Lemon handled elections in Wise County for the past 18 years. Overall, she has 27 years of election experience.

At Monday's county commissioner's meeting, commissioner's approved a budget change to hire a third person for the elections administrator office. Noble said the new employee would basically just take over his duties in voter registration. Until the new employee is hired, Noble will continue to handle his duties as deputy voter registrar in addition to the demands of the elections administrator position.

"These are rough times, we just have to make it work," said Precinct 3 commissioner Mikel Richardson.

"In the infamous words of the flight commander in the Apollo 13 mission, 'Failure is not an option,'" said Robert Rankin, Precinct 1 commissioner.