Henry Cook appeals the trial court’s ruling that he is not a resident of Randolph County and therefore not an elector qualified to vote in that county. We granted Cook’s application for discretionary appeal and directed the parties to address this Court’s jurisdiction over this appeal as well as the merits of the trial court’s ruling. Because a determination of voter qualifications, not clearly linked to a particular election, does not bring an appeal within the Supreme Court’s jurisdiction over “cases of election contest,” Ga. Const. of 1983, Art. VI, Sec. VI, Par. II 2, and because no other basis for this Court’s jurisdiction appears to exist, we transfer this case to the Court of Appeals and do not reach the merits. 1. On October 25, 2010, after a hearing held pursuant to OCGA § 21-2-228, the Appellee Board of Registrars of Randolph County ruled that Cook, who was then serving on the Randolph County Board of Education, was not a resident of Randolph County and therefore was not an elector qualified to vote in that county. See OCGA § 21-2-216 a 4 to vote in a primary or general election, a person must be a “resident of this state and of the county . . . in which he or she seeks to vote”. Appellant appealed that ruling to the superior court, see OCGA § 21-2-228 f, and filed a motion for an emergency hearing and a motion for stay and/or supersedeas, basing the motions in part on the ground that he had qualified to be on the ballot as a candidate for the School Board at the November 2, 2010, general election. Before the trial court ruled, Cook voted in and won the November 2 election; the following day, the court stayed the Board of Registrars’ ruling.
On November 29, 2010, the trial court issued an order directing that this case be tried with a separate case that Cook had filed against the Board of Elections of Randolph County, apparently after he learned that the elections board was contemplating filing a challenge to Cook’s qualifications as a candidate for the November 2 election based on the Board of Registrar’s ruling.1 On December 29, 2010, however, the trial court announced that it was dismissing the lawsuit challenging Cook’s candidacy as moot because the election had already occurred. The court proceeded only with the hearing on the appeal of the Board of Registrars’s decision regarding Cook’s qualifications as a voter.
