Johnson County candidate likely off ballot if petition challenged

A candidate for Johnson County supervisor is on the Nov. 2 general election ballot for now but likely would be removed if his nomination petition is challenged, county Auditor Tom Slockett said Wednesday night.

Mike Dooley, of rural Solon, filed his petition just before Wednesday's 5 p.m. deadline. An election clerk determined Dooley's petition had 258 signatures, above the 250 required by law.

That total does not include a page with 20 signatures that was rejected because it did not list Dooley's name, the office he was seeking and other information required by law, Slockett said in a news release. Another signature was rejected because no street address was listed.

However, Slockett said several other signatures that were accepted should have been rejected, including seven that listed only a post office box as an address, three others without a street address and two people with addresses outside Johnson County.

Those would reduce the number of valid signatures to 246, but because the Auditor's Office had already accepted Dooley's petition, it can take no further immediate action, Slockett said.

Any Johnson County resident who has the right to vote in the Nov. 2 election can challenge the petition, Slockett said, adding that  it's unlikely Dooley's petition would be considered valid if challenged.

The deadline to challenge a petition is 5 p.m. Aug. 30.

Dooley is running as an independent under the party name “Citizens for Johnson County.” The only other supervisor candidates are incumbent Democrats Sally Stutsman and Janelle Rettig. Two seats are up for election.