By Miles Layton

HERTFORD — Robbins Cherry is out as Perquimans County’s Elections Director. 

And here we go again…

This is the county’s fifth elections director to leave in about five years — Holly Hunter, Kathryn Treiber, Jackie Greene and Cherry. 

For answers, I reached out to Dianne Layden, chairwoman of the Perquimans County Board of Elections (BOE).  

When Cherry resigned July 21st, she submitted a one-sentence letter of resignation to the BOE that said nothing other than she’s resigning effective immediately, according to Layden. 

County provided Cherry’s resignation letter — see at the end of the story.

Prior to being hired as deputy elections director in February of 2025, then later moving up as director, Cherry served four years as a poll worker, chief judge and judge for the Bertie County Board of Elections. Her annual salary was $45,521, according to the county.

Kayla Shoaff is listed as the deputy director on the Perquimans Board of Elections’ website. Hired in January, Shoaff holds a degree in criminal justice technology from College of the Albemarle, and her past experience includes working as a poll worker and as an elections judge. 

Has Shoaff been named as interim director? 

Layden answered – no – the BOE is actively trying to recruit candidates to fill the director’s job. 

With the midterm election less than 90 days away, what’s the plan?

“The current plan is to sit down with the State Board of Elections folks to see what the next step is,” Layden said. 

When I interviewed Layden, she was poised to attend an important statewide Board of Elections conference in Greensboro — perhaps a prime time to look for would-be candidates to apply as the county’s elections director.  

“The conference gives us exposure to boards in all 100 counties to see if we can find an interim director,” Layden said. “I’m talking it up to everyone I’ve met so far. One of our board members, Steve Harris, developed a centerpiece that is a trifold saying ‘we’re hiring.’” 

Job Description

Here’s the job description posted to the county’s website:

Elections Director: Grade 67 (Salary Range – $44,220 – $66,966) 

A person in this position performs complex administrative and technical work planning, managing and conducting federal, state, county, municipal and special elections; supervising voter registration processes; budget preparation; precinct official training; voter and public education; compliance with state and federal laws; and related work as apparent or assigned.  Work involves setting policies and goals under the direction of the Board of Elections. Departmental supervision is exercised over Voting Systems Technician(s), temporary and full-time employees, and precinct officials to ensure that you and your staff function in total compliance with all Federal and State laws, rules, policies, State Board of Elections numbered memoranda and directives.  Applicants may apply through the Perquimans County Manager’s Office (252-426-8484).

Director is not an easy job – lots to do, but it’s doable 

Perquimans needs an elections director who’s going to stick around to put in the time needed to build a strong organization and provide a system that will serve not only the county, but the communities that hold elections – Hertford, Winfall. 

That means several things – recruiting folks to work the polls, training those folks and running drills long before game day so that everything flows seamlessly so that a turd blossom won’t be able to blast the county on the national news for being the last county in the state to report election returns. The director will need to be able to prepare an annual budget and work within that budget to conduct elections and manage an office. That person will need to understand and keep up with the latest technology needed to manage elections. And that person will need to be in close contact with the state Board of Elections – have Raleigh on speed dial. 

The director will need good customer service to answer inquiries from the public and press. I’ll say it – in the past, when covering election-related stories, perhaps about how dead people shouldn’t be able to vote in local elections, I dreaded making any phone call to the Perquimans BOE, which, if it went unanswered, required a drop-by visit that was… lacking in answers, so I often went elsewhere — the state — for answers.

Gold standard – that’s probably Kristi Nixon, director of Chowan County Elections. Knows her stuff! Highly efficient system on Election Day. Transparent — keeps the public and press apprised of any news or changes regarding elections. 

Dead People Should Not Be Allowed To Vote

To be blunt, with election integrity under intense federal scrutiny – see President Trump’s speech on primetime – the job as the county’s elections director is more important than ever. 

“For years Americans were blatantly lied to about the security of our election infrastructure, including electronic voting machines and ballot-counting systems,” Trump said in his televised address July 16. “We are releasing a series of previously-classified U.S. Intelligence Community Assessments and other reports proving that our government has long known these machines are extremely exposed to attack. As one assessment states: “We judge that U.S. adversaries, including at a minimum Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea, as well as non-state groups, have the capability to compromise U.S. election infrastructure.” The documents also state: “We assess that centralized election-related data repositories, such as voter registration databases, pollbooks, and official election websites, are most vulnerable to exploitation, and adversaries could use access to these systems to disrupt election processes.” 

To read more about what the White House released, click this link. 

Turd Blossom

I’ll say the quiet part out loud – Perquimans was the last county in the state to turn in its midterm primary election results after the election in March. 

And this was not the first time this had happened. In the election run-up to November of 2020, Perquimans County BOE voiced its ongoing concerns about whether the county would be ready for what was to become the biggest election turnout in, well, probably forever. On the ballot was President Trump versus soon-to-be President Biden.

On Election night, folks had a long, a very long wait, for Perquimans County’s election results. So long in fact that political commentator, aka former President George W. Bush’s “turd blossom”, Karl Rove, commented nationally on Fox News about how Perquimans County was the last county in the state to file its election results, although by then it was pretty clear that Trump had carried the Old North State, albeit by a narrow margin which made the county’s numbers a little more important. 

Last note — Monday, today, is Layden’s birthday — happy birthday!

Letter of Resignation