Joanna Francescut, who was passed over for Shasta County’s clerk and registrar of voters in favor of a man with no experience managing an elections office, said she intends to stay in her position to help ensure the November election goes smoothly in Shasta County.

“At this point, it’s my job, and I take great pride in this work and I love this work. We have an election to conduct, in not very many days. And so we’ve got to keep staff rolling on that work,” Francescut said Thursday.

In a 3-2 vote, the Board of Supervisors voted to appoint Thomas Toller to fill the vacant elected position of clerk and registrar of voters. During interviews for the job, Toller told the board he was a semi-retired lawyer who worked for many years as a prosecutor in the Shasta County District Attorney’s Office.

The board’s decision to hire Toller prompted a group of local residents on Thursday to begin circulating a petition to ask the ACLU to file a class-action lawsuit against the three board members who passed up Francescut in favor of a candidate with no elections experience.

Toller was one of eight people who participated in public interviews for the job. Francescut was one of two who applied for the position who had experience working in elections.

Francescut has 16 years experience working for the county elections office and for the past five years she had been the second-in-command under Cathy Darling Allen, who retired in May.

Supervisor Mary Rickert, who voted against hiring Toller, said she was glad Francescut will remain on the job.

“I think if she left that, chances are that a large number of staff would also leave. They’re very loyal to her, and they’re very fond of her, and I think that it could present a real problems for the new registrar of voters that the board majority appointed,” Rickert said.

After Toller was appointed Wednesday, he said he plans to meet with the clerk’s office staff to get to know each of them. He said he also plans to dive into learning as much as he can about elections laws.

He said in an email Thursday that he plans to meet with Francescut next week.

“I look forward to an open, constructive dialogue. I recognize the valuable contribution she could continue to make by remaining with the office. But I have made no firm decisions. Indeed, until I’m sworn in officially, I haven’t the legal capacity to make any decisions,” Toller said.

He still must undergo a background check and finish up other administrative matters before he can take office. County officials expect that to be sometime in mid-July.

State law forbids registrars from practicing law, so he would need to close down the remainder of his practice before being sworn in.

Cathy Darling Allen was reelected to the job in June 2022, receiving 68% of the vote. Toller will serve out the remainder of her term, which ends in January 2027.

Rickert said she was concerned about the elections office being run by someone with no experience.

“So to actually run an election, with all the laws and requirements that you have to follow, it’s, it’s a daunting task. And when you have a staff that you’ve been working with for many, many years ― and Joanna has been there 16 years ― it’s important that people understand the mechanics of how it works,” Rickert said.

“It’s going to be very difficult to have a leader who doesn’t understand the mechanics of how it works. And so, you know, I’m quite concerned, I do not understand the logic of the board majority as to why they think this was a good decision,” Rickert said.

The board majority has been attempting to return to hand-counting election ballots in county elections and last year terminated a contract with Dominion Voting Systems to use machines to tally votes. Using machines to count votes has been the standard in California for decades.

After the supervisors voted to hand-count ballots, the state Legislature passed a law last year banning the process in most elections.

During his job interview Toller told the supervisors he was willing to stand up to the California Secretary of State’s Office and he would be willing to help out if the county wanted to file a lawsuit against state officials over the hand-counting issue.

Rickert isn’t the only one concerned about Wednesday’s appointment. Jessica French of Redding said she attended the two days of job interviews and wondered whether the board violated any state or federal laws by passing up Francescut, with 16 years of experience, in favor of a candidate with no experience for the position.

French posted a petition on Facebook on Thursday that asks people to support asking the ACLU to consider filing a class-action lawsuit against the three supervisors who voted to hire Toller.

“We’ve been talking about this for a while, but yesterday was like the straw that broke the camel’s back. It was like, OK, enough is enough. What can we do?” French said.

“We just decided to just take action and start moving forward. So I just created a forum for people to sign up if they’re interested. I just looked at it, we needed 35 people, and it’s been up for a couple hours and we have 95 people,” French said Thursday.

Reporter Damon Arthur welcomes story tips at 530-338-8834, by email at damon.arthur@redding.com and on Twitter at @damonarthur_RS. Help local journalism thrive by subscribing today!

This article originally appeared on Redding Record Searchlight: Shasta County’s assistant elections official agrees to remain