Senate Candidate Assigns Challenger to Chatham District

Sitting in an unassuming chair in the corner of the Briarwood Coachlight Club House, Francis "Joe" Lang could almost be a poll worker.

Except he is not sitting behind a table, like the other poll workers. He does not sign voters into the book or walk them over to the polling booths. Instead, Lang, 70, is at the District 10 polling place in Chatham Township, according to official instructions, to observe the election.

Lang is an official challenger for Bill Eames' campaign for State Senator from the 27th district. Eames is running as a Tea Party candidate.

"He's not the regular Republican candidate," Lang said of Eames. "So you just want to protect yourself."

District 10 in Chatham Township, with 1,052 registered voters, is the largest voting district in the municipality, with residents from the Briarwood-Coachlight units, the Heritage apartments and other nearby neighborhoods voting at the Club House at 235 River Road.

The Morris County Board of Elections sent a letter to local candidates in May to state that any candidate for public office has the right to appoint up to two challengers for each district in which their name appears on a ballot.

The duties of a challenger, the letter goes on to say, are to "observe the conduct of an election on behalf of" a party, a political issue group or a candidate.

Township Clerk Greg LaConte said that if a challenger issues a challenge against a particular voter, the voter can vote on a provisional ballot. Provisional ballots, LaConte said, will be sent to the county for final resolution on the validity of the vote and will be sent back to the township after other ballots are counted.

Initial election results that will be released Tuesday night will not include provisional ballots, LaConte said.

LaConte said he had heard of one provisional vote cast in Chatham Township before 10:30 a.m. Tuesday, but not from District 10.

Lang, with his copy of Ronald Kessler's "In the President's Secret Service" folded open against a TV stand to mark his page, said he has not issued a challenge so far Tuesday.