Kojo Damptey calls for recount in Ward 14 following close race against Mike Spadafora

The race for a seat in Hamilton’s Ward 14 might not be over just yet after Kojo Damptey, who lost by just 79 votes is calling for a recount.

Mike Spadafora won the seat that represents a portion of Hamilton mountain after Monday’s municipal election.

Damptey says he reached out to the city and is seeking legal advice, citing issues with voting.

“There was some ballots that were not working. Some people didn’t have the right ballots. We know the issues with mail-in ballots as well, and then also all the candidates didn’t have access to the updated voter list during the day of the election,” Damptey said.

Brian Lewis, another candidate in the same ward says a manual recount may be helpful, “with the amount of lack of transparency with the city, it might not be a bad idea. There’s so much confusion at city hall in regards to the whole process, I’m wondering whether or not the ballots were possibly scanned correctly.”

Damptey also says that Spadafora violated election by-laws by placing signs in certain areas such as city-owned property.

Spadafora claims that anytime they received complaints about a sign they did send people out to remove them.

CHCH News reached out to the city but has yet to hear back.

“We received emails from a number of residents saying that candidate Spadafora was saying that he was endorsed by former mayor Eisenberger,” Damptey said.

The office of mayor Fred Eisenberger says they learned about the robocall on Monday. Spadafora reached out through a third party for an endorsement to the mayor, and a conversation was had; however, in the end, an endorsement was never provided.

“My campaign’s understanding is that we had the support of the outgoing mayor and the outgoing councillor of Ward 14 and the robocall was myself on the call. We didn’t have a formal quote or something on letterhead from the mayor,” Spadafora said.

Damptey’s not sure what will be next after seeking legal advice but he says this raises red flags.

Spadafora says he’s focusing on preparing to take his seat in city council.