Toss You For It

By Louis in News on May 3, 2007 8:04PM

Today, a coin toss by the Cook County Clerk will decide the winner of a Bedford Park Village Trustee race. The two candidates, John "Chuck" Holloway and Ronald Robison, both received 101 votes in the consolidated vote on April 17th.

Obviously this isn't an election outcome that too many people are crying over since it brought out all of 202 people to vote, but seriously, a coin toss? The flip took place at 2pm today, but there hasn't yet been an announcement of who the winner is.

It would be really difficult to swallow losing an election via coin flip, so the winner gets to challenge the election results by filing for a recount. Or, filing for the rarely used, Rock Paper Scissors Recount. How long could it take to accurately recount 202 votes?

While this seems really peculiar, the coin toss is actually written into state law, which calls for the tie breaker in village trustee races to be "determined by lot", which apparently means a coin toss. There is also the possibility that it will be use to decide the winner of the Crete Village trustee race.

Chicago has oft been accused of dirty politics and rigged elections, so we have to wonder if they checked for a two headed coin.

Update: Hold your breath no longer, Former Bedford ParkMayor, Ronald Robison, won the toss. No word on whether he chose heads or tails.