Kendall in front for Lebanon Aquatic District board seat
The Lebanon School Board may see some new members following the May 16 election, in which newcomers Melissa Baurer and Clyde Rood both had leads for seats on the board, based on vote totals on Wednesday afternoon, May 17.
In the single contested race for the Lebanon Aquatic District Board of Directors, Kim Kendall led Terrence Cadigan with 71.97% of the vote for Position 3 (2,141) to 27.16% (808) for Cadigan.
However, said Linn County Elections Supervisor Derrick Sterling, those numbers will change due to a new law, passed in 2021, which requires counties to count ballots postmarked by May 16.
The “postmark rule” states that as long as a ballot is picked up by the Postal Service and delivered within seven days to the elections office, it must be counted.
Also, Sterling said, ballots dropped off in other counties have yet to be delivered and the Elections Office staff will also need to deal with ballots that are unsigned or have “bad signatures.”
“We have a streamlined audit process for every step of the way,” he said.
That means that it may be nearly four weeks before final results are tabulated, Sterling said.
He said the most up-to-date numbers will be available on the county’s site, www.co.linn.or.us/clerk/page/election-archive.
As of Thursday afternoon, May 18, for the Lebanon School Board, incumbent Nichole Piland, who was unopposed for the Zone 5 seat, had 98.14% of the vote (2,211).
For the Zone 4 seat on the Lebanon School Board, challenger Rood led incumbent Richard Borden with 56.93% of the vote (1,873 votes) to 42.52% for Borden (1,399).
For the Zone 1 seat on the Lebanon School Board, Baurer led Scott Bruslind with 64.25% of the vote (2,273 votes) to 35.47% (1,255).
Incumbents Dale White and Robert Taylor were both unchallenged for Positions 3 and 5, respectively, on the Lebanon Rural Fire Protection District Board of Directors.
White had 98.71% (2,302) and Taylor had 98.72% (2,242).
Lebanon Aquatic District incumbent Mark McAllister (Position 2) and Jereme Guenther (Position 1) both ran unchallenged. McAllister had 98.47% of the vote (2,696) and Guenther 95.43% (2,547), with 122 write-in votes for the position.
In the race for the Zone 4 (Lebanon) seat on the Linn-Benton Community College Board of Directors, challenger Ron Edwards was leading incumbent Jeannie Davis 52.92% (1,521) to 46.38% (1,333).
The day following the election, challenger Don Frier was in a close race with incumbent Amy Vetor for the Linn-Benton-Lincoln Education Service District Zone 5 Director’s position, Frier with 48.93% of the vote (1,961) and Vetor with 50.30% (2,016).