Unofficial results from Tuesday’s municipal elections left some races too close to call – like the one for Fairbanks North Star Borough mayor, in which 43 votes separate the top two candidates. More than 900 absentee and questioned ballots were yet to tallied Tuesday night, and they’ll determine the outcome of the mayor’s race and others.
The three-way race for borough mayor won’t be settled for a week when absentee and questioned ballots are officially counted. Right now, Grier Hopkins stands as the top vote-getter with 8,766 votes, which is 43 votes ahead of John Coghill. Both are former legislators. Economic developer Robert Shields also ran but garnered only 3.5 percent of the vote.
“I would say there are several races that are undecided,” says borough Clerk April Trickey.
She and her team tallied Election Day and Early votes from 32 precincts in the borough last night. About 900 voters asked for absentee ballots and those must be postmarked by October 1st, but have seven more days to arrive at the clerk’s office.
In the meantime, the Canvass Board will start today processing the questioned ballots.
“They're going to be verifying, if the voter is eligible to vote in the municipal election,” Trickey said. “They will also be verifying that the voter didn't vote any other way, any other method in the election.”
That process takes a couple of days. Then they will turn their attention to absentee ballots that were done by in-person stations and by mail and electronic voting. After all are processed and verified, they finally get counted.
And those ballots could change some of these tight races, like Assembly Seat G, where incumbent Kristin Kelly was holding 259 votes over former Assembly member Jimi Cash. Or maybe, but less likely Seat F, where Tammie Wilson was holding 301 votes over Garrett Armstrong.
The third Assembly race, for Seat A, was won by incumbent David Guttenberg with 1,388 votes in his race against challenger Miguel Ramirez.
For School Board races, Loa Carroll-Hubbard won Seat A with only 281 votes more than Tamara Kruse Roselius. Seat B had the tightest margin after the mayor’s race, with Morgan Dulian holding 247 votes more than April Smith.
Two seats for the Interior Gas Utility Board were filled by candidates who ran unopposed: Jack Wilbur and Sherri Wall.
Trickey said the voter turnout was the highest in nearly a decade.
“It's 23.52 (percent),” she said Tuesday evening. “That's higher than what we had with the special election. So, I'm hoping with possibly what comes in, we could pull off a 25%. But we'll see.”
Voters return two incumbents to Fairbanks City Council, elect new North Pole mayor and council member, re-elect Santa Claus to council
Voters return two incumbents to Fairbanks City Council, elect new North Pole mayor
Longtime Fairbanks City Council incumbent Jerry Cleworth easily won a three-year term for Seat A Friday, with 64 percent of the votes over Sean McDonald’s 35 percent, according to unofficial numbers released Tuesday night by the borough.
In the three-way race for City Council Seat B, incumbent Valerie Therrien earned 40 percent of Election Day and Early votes combined. Olivia Rodriguez got 31 percent and Aaron Crook, 29 percent. It’s unlikely that absentee and questioned ballots would change the outcome of those races.
In North Pole, Larry Terch is the likely the new mayor. Terch got 57 percent of the vote to Anton Keller’s 41 percent. There also were six write-in votes for the seat.
And Santa Claus and Ellen Glab both won two open North Pole council seats.
