A four-judge appellate panel on Friday unanimously upheld a state court ruling ordering a referendum be held Nov. 5 on changing the Village of Pelham Manor’s election day, rejecting an appeal by the village and Westchester’s Republican elections commissioner.

If the village doesn’t appeal again, Pelham Manor residents will vote on whether to shift the balloting for mayor and trustees from the third Tuesday in March to election day in November.

The four-page decision came one day after the justices in the Appellate Division’s Second Department in Brooklyn heard oral arguments, which can be viewed here beginning at minute 19:20.

In its appeal, Pelham Manor sought to reverse state Supreme Court Judge Linda Jamieson’s decision on July 30 that the election referendum must be put on the ballot Nov. 5. Jamieson threw out all of the reasons Pelham Manor Village Clerk Lindsey Luft (who is also village manager) gave for ruling invalid the 801-signature petition calling for the public vote. The judge said Luft should immediately transmit the petition to the Westchester Board of Elections (BOE).

In an email after Friday’s decision, Luft said, “Although I fundamentally disagree with the process by which this proposition has come to be, I will be certifying the text to Westchester County as I have been ordered.”

“The village will soon provide our community with public education on what will be the subject of a public vote,” Luft said.

She did not comment on a potential appeal.

In the decision, the appellate judges specifically rejected three of the arguments made by attorney John Murtagh, who represented Pelham Manor and Luft in their effort to overturn the ruling by Jamieson, including Pelham Manor’s claim the petition’s language calling for the Westchester Board of Elections  to oversee the referendum invalidated the effort because only the village trustees can vote to ask the elections board to run the balloting.

“Contrary to the appellants’ contention, the county BOE is the proper entity to conduct the referendum, and the Supreme Court properly directed the village clerk to transmit a certified copy of the text of the referendum to the county BOE and otherwise comply with Election Law,” said the decision.

The ruling also said the referendum petitioners had not run out of time to bring their case because the Aug. 5 state deadline for delivering ballot propositions to the elections board had passed. During oral arguments, Justice Robert Miller pointed out to Murtagh that Jamieson’s ruling on July 30 called for immediate submission of the petition to the county, yet Luft didn’t do so and then the village appealed on Aug. 2.

Important Political Rights

The final issue the decision covered—all of which were considered during the civil trial before Judge Jamieson—had to do with various definitions of “regular,” “general” and “special” elections in villages as defined in the text of state laws governing both villages and elections. The appellate ruling called one definition in the law “ambiguous” and said Pelham Manor’s attempt at another was “without merit.”

“More importantly, [w]here a phrase is susceptible of two interpretations, by one of which there would be a suspension, and by the other a continuance, of important political rights, the latter is undoubtedly to be preferred,” said the decision, citing precedent.

All of the other contentions Pelham Manor made in its appeal as reasons to overturn the court decision and block the referendum “are without merit,” the court said, without providing specifics.

The appellate division justices who heard the appeal were Miller, Paul Wooten, Deborah Dowling and Janice Taylor.

Erica Winter, an organizer of the petition drive, delivered the petition on July 1 to Luft, who in her role as village clerk reviewed and rejected the petition four days later, on July 5. Winter and Pelham Democratic Town Committee Chairwoman Allison Frost brought suit July 8 against Luft, the village trustees and the county election board seeking to reverse Luft’s decision.

Winter and Frost won the case, prompting Pelham Manor’s appeal on Aug. 2.

• Read the complete appellate court ruling here.

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