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The Pima County treasurer has asked a judge to decide whether she should keep or destroy the ballots from the 2006 Regional Transportation Authority election.

Treasurer Beth Ford is legally required to destroy the ballots six months after a special election, but she has kept them for more than two years because of a civil suit against the county by the Pima County Democratic Party seeking electronic records from that election.

Now that a Pima County Superior Court judge has finished ruling on that case, Ford said her legal requirement to keep them seems to have ended.

Ford has said she will not argue in court whether the ballots should be kept or destroyed, but she merely wants a judge to decide and issue an order so whatever she does, she does legally.

The Democrats and the county Libertarian Party issued letters of opposition to any destruction, and County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry and some members of the county Board of Supervisors also have objected to destruction of the ballots.

"Each of these defendants contends that there are or may be various bases for a recount of the ballots," Ford's lawyer wrote in the filing requesting a judge's decision on the ballots.

In addition, because Huckelberry wants the ballots preserved and Ford isn't taking a position, the Pima County Attorney's Office can't represent the two different opinions, so Huckelberry advised Ford to seek outside counsel.

Ford is using John C. Richardson of the DeConcini McDonald Yetwin and Lacey law firm.

During the Democrats' suits, allegations surfaced of vote fraud during the vote on the plan and the sales tax that funds the projects in the 20-year Regional Transportation Authority plan. The state Attorney General's Office investigated the claims, but some local election-integrity advocates have said the only way to know if fraud occurred is to count the ballots.

Amid the allegations and talk on whether the ballots can be destroyed, the Regional Transportation Authority said it wants the ballots recounted and offered to pay for a hand recount to settle the issue.

According to the Pima County Superior Court's online calendar, no hearing date has been set.