Clerk Apologizes For Fremont County Map Confusion

When Bruce Hill filed a declaration to run for Fremont County commissioner Wednesday, he thought he was running for a seat in District 1. But Hill’s effort was voided Thursday after County Clerk Abbie Mace discovered Hill actually lives within Commissioner District 2 and is not eligible for the District 1 seat.

Mace said the confusion was created because precinct boundaries were not properly outlined on maps after the county’s latest redistricting.

Fremont County commissioners adopted a new boundary map Dec. 15, 2011. Mace said she asked the county’s GIS Department to update the precinct boundaries map on the county’s map server and assumed that commissioner?s districts would also be updated. But after new boundaries were adopted following a statewide lawsuit, the latest round of boundary changes were not updated on the maps.

Mace apologized to Hill, county commissioners and the public.

“It is my responsibility and no one else’s to assure that the properly adopted boundaries of the commissioner?s districts were placed into the county’s online map server,? she said. ?I should have verified that the maps had been updated. I failed to do so.”