Petition Drive Starts For Hopeful Frederick County Sheriff Candidate

George Wenschhof

Karl Bickel recently announced he was running as an unaffiliated candidate for Frederick County Sheriff. One of his reported reasons for filing as an unaffiliated candidate is he feels the Sheriff should be nonpartisan. The Frederick News Post has more here.

What is interesting is he will possibly be the first candidate for Sheriff to file a Declaration of Intent to seek Nomination by Petition in Frederick County, Maryland. In talking with Frederick County Board of Elections Director Stuart Harvey, he indicated that in talking with his staff no one could remember a petition candidate over the last twenty one years.

After filing the intent, an Unaffiliated candidate must receive signatures from 1% of the registered voters as of June 21, 2010 in Frederick County. This requirement was reduced recently by the state legislature from a previous requirement of 3%.

These signatures would then need to be submitted to the Frederick County Board of Elections by August 2, 2010. Verification of the signatures would then take place. Today, there are 134,277 registered voters in Frederick County and the needed number of signatures would be 1,343.

The current voter registration in Frederick County consists of 56,736 Republicans, 51,390 Democrats, 24,432 Unaffiliated and the remaining several thousand are various "Others".

If successful in the petition drive, Mr. Bickel would appear on the November 2 General Election ballot.

Incumbent and popular Frederick County Sheriff; Republican "Chuck" Jenkins has indicated he will be filing for reelection.

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