Elections certified

Jana Mathia, Gazette Reporter | Nov 30, 20170

While there were several close races certified by the canvassing board Tuesday, none will warrant recount. Had only two Farmington votes marked ‘yes’ instead of ‘no’, the town’s street maintenance and operation levy would have passed. Instead, Farmington is the only entity to face a failed levy measure, falling just short of 60 percent approval with only 57.69 percent.

All other levies and propositions in the county passed, including Pullman’s $10.5 and $2.4 million bonds. See page 4A for more on the Pullman propositions.

The closest race finish was between Alyssa Heagy and Jason Fletcher for the Tekoa city council seat #3 with only three votes separating them for 48.87 percent to 50 percent. Pullman’s ward #2 seat #2 ended with Garren Shannon’s 48.38 percent losing by 12 votes to Dan Records’ 50.81 percent. Four votes were all that separated races in Albion and Rosalia; Crystle Morgan broke out of a deadlocked tie with Bruce Kenoyer to garner 50 percent of the vote over his 46.49 percent for Albion’s council seat #4, and Bob Hill maintained his narrow lead over Janet Strohl, 50.85 to 49.15 percent, for Rosalia’s council #3 seat.

Election results must have a 0.025 or less margin to meet state criteria for recount. Any candidates wishing for a hand recount must pay 25 cents per ballot for the recount; if the recount changes the outcome they are reimbursed the fee.

Both contested mayors lost their seats to their challengers. Jarrod Pfaff will reclaim the Garfield mayor seat he gave up four year ago after claiming 58.40 of the vote to top Ray McCown’s 40 percent. McCown took the seat in 2013 with only two votes above his opponent. In Rosalia, challenger Lee Root unseated Nanette Konishi with 141 to her 95.

Write-in votes for Ray Heitstuman won him the Uniontown council #5 seat. Heitstuman claimed 51.35 percent approval with 38 votes while incumbent Steve Kelly garnered only 36 votes.

Returned ballots numbered 8,624, marking a 38.9 percent turnout of the 22,169 registered voters who were mailed ballots. The canvassing board, composed of County Commissioner Art Swannack, County Prosecutor Denis Tracy and County Auditor Eunice Coker, certified the election results Tuesday morning after inspected challenged ballots Monday. For more on the challenged and rejected ballots, see the Bulletin Column, page 8A.

The topic of validation was often brought up during the past month as Pullman crawled to reach validation of its bond measures. Coker noted Tuesday the new validation numbers for next year’s election will now be tabulated for the February election. Measures for the February ballot are due to the elections office by Dec. 15.

For a full breakdown of county contested races and propositions, see page 4A.