Contested races range from winners to waiters

Ken Stern | Nov 14, 20180

The slow, and low, vote counts in Skagit County means several contested races cannot be called, primarily the two 10 District legislative positions.

On the county level, Jackie Brunson is likely to be the County’s next treasurer, defeating Brad Whaley. Likewise, Sandy Perkin’s lead over Mike Urban for county auditor will almost certainly hold. Laura Riquelme is winning by 1,929 votes and seven percentage points over Rosemary Kaholokula for Skagit Superior Court Judge Position 2.

Tom SeGuine has a substantial 4,730 vote lead over Cecily Hazelrigg-Hernandez in Skagit County for Court of Appeals, Division 1, District 3 Judge Position 1. However, Hazelrigg-Hernandez is up by 8,600 votes and five percentage points in the four-county district. SeGuine is up by 18 percentage points in the county. His Skagit margin needs to be over 30 percent to win.

If funding is destiny, and the top fundraiser is usually the victor, this is who Washington’s 10th District legislators will be in January: Incumbent Norma Smith, R- Clinton, will again defeat Mount Vernon’s Scott McMullen. She will reverse the primary election, which McMullen narrowly won. Smith raised $172,661 to McMullen’s $85,522.

Smith is up 3,350 votes district wide, but McMullen holds a 2.7 percent lead, 270 votes in the county.

Dave Paul, a Skagit Valley College Whidbey Island campus administrator, has a 191 vote margin in the district over incumbent David Hayes. Paul upset Hayes by 2,411 votes in August. Paul’s lead in Skagit is 505 votes and five percentage points.

Paul has spent $299,000, besting Hayes by $88,000. Outside groups poured $97,000 into Paul’s campaign.

District 10 is comprised of Island County and the northwestern tip of Snohomish, and the southwestern part of Skagit counties.

State legislators make $48,731 for the part-time positions.

The exception to more money winning is Mike Urban in his campaign for county auditor against long time deputy auditor Sandy Perkins. Perkins leads in votes 14,518 to 10,677 and 15 percentage points. The spread has not diminished. Urban made himself visible with yard signs and newspaper ads, spending $28,063 against Perkins’ $15,649.

The vote to create a charter for Skagit County, on the ballot as approving the election of freeholders, or delegates, will be overwhelmingly defeated. The no vote is in the 66 percent range. In 2003 the vote against charter gained over 71 percent of the vote.

The No on Charter campaign reports contributions of $58,760. Home Rule Skagit, promoting a yes vote, raised $20,842.

Skagit County’s vote tallying lags entire state

Ken Stern

The ballot counting remained painfully slow in Skagit County through the end of last week. At Friday’s end 60 percent of the estimated 54,559 ballots cast had been counted. The next update for the roughly 22,000 uncounted collected ballots was Tuesday. That total is 10 percent of the estimated outstanding ballots statewide through Nov. 12. King County hds 9,000 outstanding ballots out of over one million cast Monday.

A design error allowed a fold across the ballot, preventing an accurate machine count and mandating hand counting. On election night only 11 percent of votes cast were reported counted. While counties have until Nov. 27 to send vote totals to the secretary of state, most counties are much further along: Seven of the state’s 39 counties have 100 or fewer ballots uncounted. Only Yakima County is reporting a lower voter turnout than Skagit based on outstanding ballots.

Whatcom County has 34 votes to count, Snohomish County 4,200, Island County 750 and San Juan County 145.

The election office will update totals daily, a staff person said Tuesday morning.

The elections office will finish the County’s count by the Nov. 27 deadline, according to earlier reports.

Votes in Skagit County will total about 54,500 this election. The 72 percent turnout is much higher than almost any previous mid-term election. There are 75,699 registered county voters.