By of the

While Waukesha County Executive Dan Vrakas and his chief of staff insisted Tuesday that County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus was not the one in charge of election duties for the recall election, she appeared to be at the helm.

Nickolaus refused to respond to questions in her office, turning her back and closing her office door while a reporter waited at a service counter. Her deputy, Kelly Yaeger, didn't respond, either.

Nickolaus was observed passing out election supplies to local clerks leading up to Tuesday's election, and she's the one who fielded questions Tuesday from the field, said Gina Kozlik, Waukesha's deputy clerk-treasurer.

Shawn Lundie, Vrakas' chief of staff, said he was confident procedures put in place with Yaeger would ensure smooth reporting of votes Tuesday night. Vote counting in the county clerk's office appeared to go smoothly - an assessment confirmed by Lundie. About 80% of the vote was reported by about 10 p.m.

On Tuesday, Vrakas responded to complaints that Nickolaus was running the election:

"It's absolutely not true. She agreed to step aside and hand off her duties to Kelly (Yaeger), and that has occurred."

Meanwhile, an observer with the Democratic Party, Jordan Primakow, said Nickolaus was being cooperative as he sat in her reception area, where he arrived at 7:30 a.m.

He called the morning fairly quiet, with scattered reports of problems relayed by Nickolaus to him, including a jammed machine in Oconomowoc that was quickly replaced.

He said only Nickolaus approached him with updates, not Yaeger.

Nickolaus drew criticism last year during a tight state Supreme Court race when she announced nearly two days after the election that she failed to include 14,000 votes from Brookfield in her unofficial totals. The error helped lead to a statewide, taxpayer-financed recount and flipped what appeared to be a close loss for Justice David Prosser to a 7,000-vote victory.

Results have been slow in other races, as well. During the April 3 election, Nickolaus failed to post timely election results online and update them periodically for the public, as promised. The public was left in the dark for hours after voting ended, while reporters and data collectors for election reporting services resorted to tabulating contested races from yards of paper tapes hanging on walls around a meeting room. The process was akin to reading a long grocery receipt where, in some cases, the tape stretched down the wall and onto the floor in a heap.

In response to widespread criticism, Vrakas said he asked Nickolaus to step aside - or face his public call for her resignation - so that the credibility of Waukesha County elections could be restored.

Not seeking re-election

While he then announced she had agreed to pass off her election duties to her deputy, Nickolaus later announced she would not seek re-election in November. In her announcement, she said she maintained authority and responsibility for elections while in office.

Unlike the previous fiascos, the May reporting of the recall primary went relatively smoothly. Nickolaus' office does not count votes. Municipal clerks and poll workers do that job. They report results to the county clerk, and she is responsible for reporting the unofficial county results and canvassing for official results days later.

Under a new system of reporting put in place in May under pressure from Vrakas and with help from the state Government Accountability Board, local municipal clerks enter the data into a state canvass reporting system, rather than relying on the county to accumulate that data. The county clerk's office then relays that information to the public, showing the breakdown of votes by precinct and in summary.

Bill Glauber of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report.