At least one council candidate won’t have to participate in a general election run-off for the Holbrook City Council in May. C.J. Wischmann was elected outright in the March 10 primary election by receiving more than half of the total votes cast, according to the unofficial results available Wednesday morning. As a result, he is directly elected to the city council.
Bobby Tyler, who had no opposition, was elected outright as mayor with 391 votes.
The question of Home Rule also passed handily with 322 “yes” votes and 115 “no” votes. The decision will allow city staff and council members to set a budget based on income the city receives rather than on limitations set by the state.
As of press time, a total of 489 ballots had been counted in the primary election. An additional 40 remained uncounted while awaiting verification.
Unofficial totals show that Wischmann received 295 votes, well more than half of the ballots cast in the election.
“The rest is undetermined due to a misspelling of names,” City Clerk Cher Reyes explained.
Write-in candidate Francie Payne received a total of 220 votes, several shy of the number necessary to be elected outright. According to Reyes, however, Payne received a large number of votes in which her name was misspelled. She explained that the election board would be meeting and she would be contacting officials to determine what action must be taken regarding the misspelled names. Other write-in candidates Tim Dixon and Earl Kester also received votes with misspellings of their names, but not in large enough quantities to potentially be elected outright.
Candidate David Newlin, whose name was printed on the ballot, received 178 votes, followed by write-ins Dixon with 128 and Kester with 103.
Reyes explained that the 40 uncounted ballots would be verified and counted as quickly as possible so they could be added to the total. Those ballots included early ballots that were dropped off on election day and must be verified prior to being counted. A meeting of the election board was planned for Wednesday afternoon.
If Payne is directly elected to the council following a review of the misspelled and uncounted ballots, only the top two remaining candidates will face off in the general election. As the results stand at press time, those candidates would be Newlin and Dixon, however, uncounted ballots and misspelled names could potentially change those results. If Payne is not elected outright, all four remaining candidates, including Payne, Newlin, Dixon and Kester, will vie for two seats on the council in the May general election.
