By Joshua Shimkus, Moline Dispatch and Rock Island Argus, Ill. The Tribune Content Agency
The Village of Milan's electoral board voted Monday to strike the nomination papers for Chad Horton, who intended to run for mayor, and Dan Verbeke, an incumbent village trustee who intended to run for reelection, after challenges were filed to the petitions and signatures they collected.
Debbra Kunst, who is also running for village trustee, filed both objections. Kunst objected to Horton's candidacy paperwork because while it had signatures, the rest of the paperwork wasn't completely filled out, missing information on some lines like what position he was running for, what political party he was running as a member of and the date of the election.
"It's very confusing for voters to know what they're signing," Kunst said at the board hearing.
Kunst also objected to the candidacy of Dan Verbeke, who filed to run as an independent. Mayor Duane Dawson had circulated Verbeke's petitions, but he had also circulated an earlier set of petitions for a Democratic candidate. According to discussion at the board meeting, Dawson cannot circulate petitions for two different party affiliations.
"I didn't consider independent as being another party, so it's my mistake, I have no objection to what you're saying," Dawson said to Kunst at the meeting.
Neither Horton nor Verbeke were at the hearing on Monday, and so they could not argue their case. Members of the electoral board said that Horton and Verbeke had been sent notice of the meeting in the mail, but that they had not received confirmation from the candidates. The board held the meeting with the stipulation that they would address objections raised by Horton or Verbeke in the future if they had not received notification.