A Times Editorial

Candidate makes much ado about voting cards

Pasco Elections Supervisor Kurt Browning tried to provide some answers Tuesday as to why the U.S. Postal Service returned 50,000 voter identification cards to his office. But the biggest question remained a mystery: Just why would anyone consider this criminal behavior?

Browning, meeting with reporters Tuesday morning, listed a handful of reasons for the returned cards. The majority can be attributed to voters failing to provide accurate forwarding addresses and to seasonal residents who stopped their mail temporarily.

Nearly 20 percent of the 230,000 identification cards, sent to Pasco voters because of postcensus changes in polling sites and district boundaries, were returned last week.

While Browning sorted out the returns, Democratic congressional candidate Chuck Kalogianis resorted to the flash-over-substance trademark of his candidacies. Kalogianis went headline-grabbing with a plea for a criminal investigation into the identification cards.

It's unfortunate. Kalogianis should have matured beyond tossing about baseless accusations as he did four years ago in an unsuccessful run for the state House. This time, the target wasn't a political opponent. Still, the careless commentary did little to reinforce confidence in his own judgment.

Kalogianis, saying he feared bad press for the electoral process, issued a statement last week that guaranteed just that. His call for a Florida Department of Law Enforcement investigation of the returned cards is misguided.

Browning said Kalogianis, in an e-mail to the supervisor's office, repeated his request to the governor's office and promised to seek a judge's order to preserve the returned cards.

"What does he think I'm going to do, back up a truck and get rid of these things?" Browning said in an interview last week.

Kalogianis, shooting television commercials for his congressional campaign, was unavailable for a deadline comment Tuesday, but did issue a statement calling for a slew of federal election reforms.

He would have been better served by more immediate practicality. Instead of asking the state police to nose around, Kalogianis could have volunteered to help canvass the Pasco portion of the 9th Congressional District to ensure voters know where they should be casting ballots on Election Day.

It would be a simple question to pose to potential voters as he helicopters around the district. He also could provide the Pasco Supervisor of Elections Office telephone number, 1-800-851-8754, or its Web site address, www.pascovotes.com, to voters seeking additional information.

Such a tactic would indicate Kalogianis is indeed interested in providing a public service, instead of self-aggrandizing lip service.

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