Bayside Council Candidate Sues City Over Pending Election Results

BAYSIDE, QUEENS — A Bayside City Council candidate is demanding that the Queens Supreme Court review the ballots in her still-pending Council race.

A week after Election Day, Vickie Paladino, the Republican pick for District 19's City Council seat, sued the Board of Elections, which still hasn't fully tabulated the ballots in her Council race.

Paladino, a business owner and conservative activist, has narrowly led the race since Election Night; as of Nov. 12 the city's unofficial results show her leading Democratic nominee Tony Avella by 1,653 votes, part of a red wave in this year's City Council election, especially in Queens.

The race, however, remains too-close-to-call by outlets like NY1 and the New York Times, which both show Paladino leading Avella with about 50 percent of the votes, though only 88 percent of ballots are accounted for.

Official results will likely come down to the remaining absentee ballots, which the BOE still hasn't tabulated ten days after the election — prompting Paladino's lawsuit.

The suit, which was filed on Nov. 9, calls on the Queens Supreme Court to "expeditiously" review the BOE's tabulations and check its final results to "determine if they are correct."

This kind of suit, as pointed out in the lawsuit itself, is not uncommon, especially in instances when an election is neck-and-neck.

The District 19 Council race is not the only local election that remains undetermined in New York City. There are two other close contests in Brooklyn where many absentee votes — which will determine the election — remain outstanding.

Paladino, as well as her opponents named in the suit — Avella and John-Alexander Sakelos, who ran on the Conservative party line after losing out on the GOP nomination — did not respond to Patch's requests for comment. Neither did the Board of Elections.