Some party leaders still adjusting to new reorganization law

Here’s a reminder to Democrats and Republicans: a relatively new state law passed in 2021 moved county and municipal political party reorganizations until after county committee elections are certified.

The calendar used to be more compact.  County committee elections would be held on a Tuesday in June – the same day as the primary – with winners certified by Friday.  Municipal committees would meet the following Monday to elect new officers, and county chairs were elected the next evening.  Terms for county committee, municipal chairs, and county chairs were one year.

But now, the election season extends beyond Election Day.  Vote-by-mail ballots that once had to be in hand by the time the polls closed now have six days to arrive as long as they are postmarked.  Provisional ballots can’t be counted until after all the VBMs are in, and voters have until thirteen days after the election to cure certain technical defects in the mail-in ballots.

Now it takes over two weeks to certify results.

As a result, the legislature changed the law to require county committee members to take office “by the third Saturday following the certification of the results of their election.”

“The annual meeting of each county committee shall be held by the third Saturday following the certifications of the results of the primary election, except that when such meeting day falls on a legal holiday,” the statute states.

Still, some party leaders have not yet adjusted to the requirement that county committee members can’t vote until their election has been certified – even if the outcomes of the race are not in question.

In Rockaway Township, Republicans held their reorganization meeting on June 8, less than 48 hours after the polls closed.  They re-elected Rachael Brookes as municipal chair; she had lost her own county committee race by a wide margin against Tucker Kelley, but party by-laws don’t require the municipal chair to be a county committee member.

Now the local GOP in Rockaway will need to conduct a do-over of the election, even though the outcome will remain the same, Morris GOP officials told the New Jersey Globe.

Sussex County Democratic initially set their reorganization meeting for June 13, but the county chair, Dawne Rowe, rescheduled it for June 27 after being made aware of the new law.