After a brief hearing March 27, Judge John McVay indicated he likely will strike two objections filed against Pine-Richland School Board candidate Robert Stein.
The objections, filed by Pine-Richland attorney Chris Cafardi, alleged that Stein, who is running in Region 2 of the district, did not have enough Democratic signatures for his petition to run in the Democratic primary and that some signatures on his Republican petition were invalid.
For both Republican and Democratic primary elections, a candidate must submit a petition with signatures from 10 party members. Though Stein’s Democratic petition had 10 signatures, Cafardi alleges one of the signers was actually an independent, which would leave the candidate with an insufficient amount to run.
As for the Republican petition, Cafardi said several of the signers did not actually sign the petition themselves, making them invalid. In response, Stein’s attorney, Thomas King, admitted that some of the signatures were written by family members of other signers or were otherwise invalid. Still, he said, enough signatures were left to keep the petition valid.
King, argued that Cafardi did not serve these objections to the Allegheny County Elections Division before the March 18 deadline to do so, rendering them null. He further pointed out that the law does not allow Cafardi, a registered Republican, to challenge a Democratic petition in the first place.
Though McVay seemed sympathetic to Cafardi’s point that the tight deadline was “overly formalistic,” he ultimately said that case law was “abundantly clear” that objections must be served by the deadline.
Cafardi, though recognizing the procedural issues, still moved to present evidence against the validity of Stein’s petitions because of what he said were “allegations of actual fraud.” But the judge declined to hear this.
After the hearing, Cafardi said there was substance to his objections, but he did not expect them to go any further because of the deadline and party registration issues.
Stein declined to comment after the hearing, but King said the law was “crystal clear” and Cafardi simply did not follow it.
In Region 2, Stein will face four cross-filed challengers for the two open seats, among them incumbent Amy Terchick and Cafardi’s wife, Amy, as well as incumbent Christina Brussalis, who filed solely for the Republican race.
The primary elections are set for May 20.