Secretary of State Karen Handel’s office is still conducting an investigation of Carroll County Board of Commissioners Chairman Bill Chappell for alleged campaigning at a polling precinct while voting was taking place.

“That investigation is still ongoing,” said Matt Carothers, a spokesman for Handel. “We’re still looking into it.”

Chris Brown of the Inspector General’s office, the branch of the Secretary of State’s office specifically in charge of conducting election-related investigations, confirmed the investigation is still active, saying, “That is an open investigation.”

Chappell, a Republican, won his bid for re-election on Nov. 4, 2008, defeating Democrat Herman Ayers.

Prior to election day, during the advance voting period, Handel’s office received complaints alleging Chappell was talking to voters and shaking hands before and after they voted at the David A. Perry County Administration building precinct.

Patti Brown-Traylor, elections supervisor for the county, said Chappell came to the polling place for several weeks leading up to election day, sometimes two or three times in a single day, during advance voting. On the Monday two weeks before the election, he was told “he needed to go upstairs” by a member of the elections staff, and the next day when he returned again, Brown-Traylor told him the Secretary of State had received several complaints from voters who not only felt it was a violation of the law for him to be there but felt they were being “intimidated.”

In late October of last year, Brown-Traylor said Chappell said “that he was the commissioner of this county, and he had the authority to monitor any of the offices.” That conversation was verified at that time by Voter Registration Coordinator Janice Duff and other election personnel.

When asked about his presence at the precinct, Chappell said in October, “When I walked by and somebody stuck their hand out, I shook it, but I did not campaign.” He said, on average, he was there between two and three minutes.

Randy Gates, a Carrollton resident, said at the time of the alleged incidents he saw Chappell in the polling place for a period of between 20 and 25 minutes. Gates said that while he was waiting in line to vote, he saw Chappell stand just outside the room where the voting machines are located and have several conversations with people, including election staff and voters, as they entered the room to cast their ballot.

Signs posted at the entrances to the building during last year’s election season read, “No Campaigning by anyone (including candidates) within 150 feet of the outer edge of any building within which a polling place is established.” Another sign, posted on the outside door to the precinct, read, “That no person may campaign; distribute literature of written or printed matter of any kind ... or perform similar activities within 150 feet of the building in which a polling place is located. Pursuant to O.C.G.A. 21-2-214.”

Brown-Traylor said last October that the only reason for which he could justifiably be in the precinct besides casting a ballot would be to turn in an ethics form required of all candidates.

Chappell denied being told to leave the precinct by election staff.

Jewell Mashburn, the staff member who confronted Chappell, said at that time she told Chappell he should leave.

“I said ‘you better go upstairs before you get into trouble,’” Mashburn said in October.

Regardless of whether election officials want him down there, Chappell said in October, his position as chairman entitled him to be there.

“If I have a reason to go down there, I’ll go down there,” he said. “I’m the chairman of Carroll County.”

State law spells out who can be inside a precinct and what they can be doing while votes are being cast, regardless of their position or rank.

O.C.G.A. 21-2-414 states, “No person whose name appears as a candidate on the ballot being voted upon at a primary, election, special primary, or special election, except a judge of the probate court serving as the election superintendent, shall physically enter any polling place other than the polling place at which that person is authorized to cast his or her ballot for that primary, election, special primary, or special election and, after casting his or her ballot, the candidate shall not return to such polling place until after the poll has closed and voting has ceased.”

Tex McIver, the vice chairman of the state election board, the body that would hear the case, said that in determining punishment for such offenses, the board especially frowns upon those who knew the law but chose to violate it regardless.

“We think that if you know the rules and you, knowing those rules, chose to violate them, we don’t take kindly to that, and we tend to have a more severe penalty,” McIver said.

Punishment can range from a monetary fine to the formal issuing of a cease and desist order to the issuing of a letter of admonishment.

The next meeting of the board is scheduled for early August, and the agenda for that meeting has yet to be announced.