Bannock County Assessor recall effort fails to gather enough signatures

The petition to recall the Bannock County assessor, Shari Davies, failed to gather enough signatures to move the issue to the March ballot.

Claudia Ortega, the woman behind the effort, posted to the Pocatello/Bannock Homeowner’s Alliance Facebook page on Tuesday evening that she had informed the elections’ office that the petition was 574 signatures short of the required amount.

“Out of respect for the taxpayers of Bannock County, we are not going to waste the resources of the Elections Office by having them validate the signatures, since we do not have the numbers we need,” Ortega wrote in the Facebook post.

The effort to recall the assessor is in response to the county-wide property assessment hikes that caused confusion and frustration for property owners.

“The Elections Office is getting ready for an election and having them waste their time, when we know we do not have enough signatures to recall Sheri Davies would be a waste of resources and inconsiderate,” she wrote.

The petition was due on Tuesday evening, but once Ortega realized the numbers were inadequate, she began shredding the petitions to protect the identities of the people who signed.

“We have already heard of people suffering retaliation for having signed the petitions,” Ortega wrote.

Davies denies that she ever pressured anyone to not sign the petitions or threatened retaliation.

The Homeowner’s Alliance will continue to collect signatures for the petition to recall the commissioners. Those signatures are due to be turned in on Oct. 5; 9,101 valid signatures are required.

KIFI 2019