Secretary of State Chet Culver reprimanded Story County Auditor Mary Mosiman on Friday for not responding quickly enough in opening a new voting station at Parks Library for Monday.

Mosiman announced Friday morning the station would not open, which directly opposed Culver’s earlier announcement that it would.

The date for early balloting was set after a satellite voting station closed Oct. 21 with more than 100 potential voters still in line, even though Iowa law requires polling stations to stay open until everyone in line at closing time has voted.

Mosiman said she decided to cancel the station after waiting to hear from Culver’s office about an administrative rule requiring a seven-day notice before opening a polling station.

Phyllis Peters, a spokeswoman for Culver’s office, said Culver was willing to waive the rule, because it wasn’t a law, but needed a request from the auditor’s office first. Peters said such a request was never made.

“The issue is to get voting rights to 100 students,” she said. “It just drug out because no notice was given.”

Mosiman’s lack of action caused Culver to issue a technical infraction — one of the first times his office has done so.

One of the reasons for not asking for a waiver, Mosiman said, was because Culver’s office wasn’t forthcoming with information about the waiver. She said her concerns about the legality of the new date were going unanswered by Culver’s office, which is why she didn’t respond quickly.

“Mr. Culver made that statement that there would be satellite voting, when truly it was not something that I wanted to do,” she said. “I wanted to know if it was truly an option, but it is truly not an option because of the legal notice of publication.”

She said having the extra station would possibly “jeopardize the entire integrity of the election system in Story County.”

According to a notice sent to Mosiman by Charles Krogmeier, first deputy to Culver, state officials had attempted to contact Mosiman on many occasions and had quickly responded to questions she had about the legality of the situation.

According to e-mails sent to Mosiman from Culver’s office, she had been contacted on Wednesday with information about how to set up a station and obtain a waiver.

Meanwhile, Andrew Smalley, chairman of the Story County Republican Party, issued a statement calling for an investigation of Culver’s actions related to the voting incident.

“Chet Culver has invaded Story County in an blatant attempt to politicize a relatively minor problem with satellite voting in Story County,” Smalley said.

Other counties have had similar situations, he said, and auditors there haven’t received similar reprimands. Mosiman also said she felt the situation had been politicized to a degree.

Peters said the reason is because other auditors have reacted faster than Mosiman did.

Jan Bauer, chairwoman of the Story County Democratic Party, said she was afraid Mosiman’s decision would disenfranchise students at Iowa State.

“When you cancel a polling place, of course there is going to be some effect,” she said.

Seth Landau, ISU coordinator for the New Voters Project, said he was disappointed that the date had been canceled, since it diminished the opportunity for students to vote. Mosiman has pointed other previously scheduled dates were available for satellite voting, but both Bauer and Landau said it is inconvenient for students to go to other locations.