Monessen mayor-elect seeks write-in vote totals

Ron Mozer, mayor-elect of Monessen, was sure he captured the city’s top elected office last month when he received nearly 1,100 votes cast as the only candidate on the ballot.

What he didn’t know, though, was who received more than 550 write-in votes in the race.

“Maybe I’m old school. But as an elected official, I am a servant to those who elected me and everyone else. I’ve got to represent everybody,” Mozer said this week as he addressed the county elections board to ask that every write-in vote cast in his race be made public.

The Westmoreland County Election Bureau published a list of write-in votes cast Nov. 2. However, that list identified who received write-in votes only if it determined the outcome of the race.

In races where write-in votes were not a determining factor, such as for Monessen mayor, the county listed only the total that were cast.

An inventory of other votes in each race — for names that include legitimate write-in candidates, celebrities, national politicians and fictitious characters such as Mickey Mouse — is available for review at the courthouse, said Greg McCloskey, interim election bureau director.

“We had 22,000 write-in votes cast. It was an astronomical number this year, and we can’t publish a list of every name,” McCloskey said.

Officials said write-in vote totals exceeded those cast in recent elections and had a substantial impact on dozens of races this fall.

Of all the races on this year’s ballots, 39 ended in ties. Many of those involved write-in votes in which one or two candidates received a single vote each.

In Jeannette, no candidates appeared on the ballot for the controller’s race. It was decided by a casting of lots after 30 people obtained one write-in vote each in the race.

“With 22,000 write-in votes, it’s really hard to count every one,” Westmoreland County Commissioner Doug Chew said.

About 5,800 write-in votes were cast in the November 2020 presidential election, McCloskey said. There were just fewer than 8,000 write-in votes cast in the November 2019 election.

Election officials said every write-in vote is counted.

County leaders will consider publishing a full inventory that identifies every write-in vote in future elections.

“It’s an evolutionary process, and we will look at it,” Commissioner Sean Kertes said. “We are going to make some tweaks and changes.”

The outcome for Monessen mayor was never in doubt once the ballots were counted when the polls closed. Mozer, a Democrat, was the lone candidate on the ballot after he defeated incumbent Mayor Matt Shorraw in the May primary. Mozer also won the Republican primary through a successful write-in campaign in the spring.

Still, Mozer received just 67% of the vote last month. Shorraw received 527 write-in votes, according to the election bureau.

Shorraw said he is grateful for the support and plans to run for mayor again in four years.

“I have no plans to go away. I will continue to watch closely and make sure things are done properly,” Shorraw said. “I’ve been involved in volunteering throughout the city since before Mr. Mozer moved to Monessen, and I will continue to do so long after he’s gone.”

Monessen, a city of 7,300, has for years seen political upheaval, with Shorraw and Mozer at the center of some of the recent disputes. Mozer successfully sued the city and Shorraw in 2020 over alleged violations of the state’s open meeting law.

This year, Shorraw sued the city’s redevelopment authority, on which Mozer serves, over alleged open meeting law violations.

Mozer said he has no ulterior motives in seeking out the names of those who received write-in votes in the mayor’s race.

“I just need to see who those people are,” Mozer said.