Two years ago, the Cache County Clerk’s Office was coming off a state review that found multiple violations of election law. Now, that same office is being recognized by the state for excellence in election administration.
In the spring of 2024, Bryson Behm stepped into the role of Cache County clerk after his predecessor, David Benson, resigned. By then, the office had spent months under investigation over its handling of the 2023 election.
“The clerk at the time was put on leave," Behm recalled, "and well, he didn't have election experience himself, but it was a brand new staff who had no idea what they were doing either.”
Behm, on the other hand, had previously served as chief deputy clerk, and already had several elections under his belt.
“I came in," he said, "and we kind of just got together and I'm like, ‘It's going to be hard, but we're going to do this together. I have certain ways that I know how to do some stuff, and then we can rely on some other counties to look at their processes.’”
Then, late last month, Behm’s office was awarded a recognition for “Excellence in Elections” by the lieutenant governor’s office. Chief Deputy Clerk Michelle Stanger was also individually honored for her exceptional work as an election official.
Behm said the recognition wasn’t just for correcting the problems identified by the state, but for additional changes his office has made since then.
“We have a chain of custody digital form that's on all of our drop boxes so we can track when each drop box has been picked up and been opened," he said. "We also have trackers on all of our keys and cars so we know exactly where our ballot picker-uppers are.”
He added that Cache County is one of only a handful of counties that use a QR code scanning system for tracking. It’s also the only county with what Behm calls the “city liaison program,” which assigns an election official to each city in the county.
“So during municipal elections, specifically last year, they had somebody to directly contact about their city election," Behm said. "So they don't have to, you know, play phone tag with somebody.”
But beyond the updates to Cache County’s election processes, Behm said the best county clerk’s office is one that goes unnoticed.
“Good election administration is quiet, stable, and trustworthy," he said. "I feel like the less that I'm in the news, the better — well, for bad things, obviously. The previous administrations — I feel like every time you saw them in the news, it was always something that they were doing wrong.”
Stability has been hard to come by — the past three Cache County clerks that preceded Behm all left office before the end of their terms.
Behm is now running for a full term of his own in the November midterm elections.
