Orange County election monitor Bill Coles won’t seek re-election

ORANGE COUNTY, Florida. Bill Coles, Orange County’s longest-serving election observer, will retire at the end of his current term to spend time with his family, he announced Wednesday.

“It was a role of a lifetime to have the citizens of Orange County trust to conduct a safe (election) with the highest standards of integrity,” Coles said in a statement.

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Now nearly 70 years old, Coles’ 33-year career in the Orange County election observer’s office, which he notes will be 35 years old by the time he actually ends his job on January 6, 2025, began in 1989 with his hiring for a managerial position. deputy In 1996, Coles was elected to his current post and never lost a single contest to keep it.

Coles’ first countywide election was in 1997 over a proposed dime sales tax increase in what he said was the largest mail-in ballot at the time, citing the United States Postal Service. 2000 brought Coles his first presidential election, although he noted that “Chad never came to Orange County” in regards to the five-week process it took for the Florida recount, which resulted in George W. Bush winning 537 votes. Albert Gore. He added that the most contentious election Coles oversaw was the 2020s.

“From hanging fumes to a complete overhaul of election cybersecurity and today’s transparency, Supervisor Coles has held the helm in turbulent and changing times,” the press release said. “Bill Coles will leave the Electoral Commission in safe hands by assembling a team of professionals with over 300 years of combined electoral experience. Several senior staff members have more than 15 years of experience in local election commissions, other districts in Florida, and even in several states.”

Some of Coles’s other awards include his creation in 1998 of the county’s Adopt a Plot Program, a community partnership that allows organizations to act as poll workers in team building and fundraising, the report said. Coles’ office said half of all polling stations in the country were filled by such groups in the 2022 general election.

Coles graduated from the University of Central Florida in 1976 with a degree in public administration. He is currently a member of the UCF Public Administration Advisory Board.

Also cited are Coles’s past roles as a 13-year member of the Boy Scouts of America in Central Florida, four years on the Board of Advisors to the Federal Election Assistance Commission, a term as president of the Florida State Election Observers Association, and as president of the International Association of Clerks, Registrars, Election Commissioners. and treasurers.

He seeks to withdraw into private life in order to spend more time with his four grandchildren, two sons and wife Cheryl, whom he married in 1978.

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