Middletown Unified’s $38 million school bond lost ground Tuesday when Lake County counted 3,416 more ballots. Measure C needs 55% of the vote to pass. It now has 54.24%.
The bond has 896 yes votes and 756 no votes in the county’s second results report, released Tuesday. At that total, passing would take 909 yes votes, 13 more than it has. After the first count on Nov. 4, it was five votes short.
The new Measure C ballots ran 290 yes to 252 no, or 53.5% yes. All of the added votes came from mail ballots. The in-person count, 170 yes to 127 no, didn’t change. In-person voters backed the bond at 57.24%. Mail voters have backed it at 53.58%.
Most of what’s left is mail. The county has an estimated 10,952 ballots still to count, according to the registrar’s election page. About 96% are mail ballots: 9,977 that arrived by Election Day, 394 that arrived in the week after, and 154 forwarded from other counties. The rest are 284 provisional ballots and 143 that are damaged or need more review.
Neither the county nor the state says how many of those ballots came from the Middletown district. The district has 6,422 registered voters, and 1,747 of their ballots have been counted.
The bond would pay for roofs, heating and air-conditioning systems, science and career-technical buildings, and permanent classrooms to replace portables, according to the voter pamphlet. Property owners in the district would pay about $49 per $100,000 of assessed value each year.
Clearlake’s treasurer measure narrows
Clearlake’s Measure D would make the city treasurer an appointed job instead of an elected one. It needs a majority of the votes cast to pass. Its lead shrank from 20 votes to 7, at 694 yes and 687 no.
The ballots added Tuesday went 214 no and 201 yes. Mail voters still favor the measure, 550 to 520. In-person voters opposed it 167 to 144.
No one qualified to run for treasurer this year, the city’s candidate list shows. If Measure D passes, the council appoints someone.
In the race for two Clearlake council seats, Dean Clark leads with 566 votes. Incumbent Russell Cremer is second with 537. Zabdy Neria is third with 494, 43 votes behind Cremer. On election night the gap was 34. Alvaro Valencia has 461 and Carlos Ramos 426.
Fire and water boards
In the Lake County Fire Protection District, two seats are open and both incumbents are running, the special district candidate list shows. Adam Wade Clanton, who is listed on the ballot as a retired fire captain, leads with 1,117 votes. Incumbent Diane M. Watson is second with 1,048. Incumbent Denise Loustalot is third with 679.
In the Clearlake Oaks County Water District, incumbent Stan Archacki is third for two full-term seats. He has 158 votes, 59 behind A. Donald Whittier, who has 217. Christine “Chris” Gardas leads with 269. Archacki was 40 votes back after the first count.
Upper Lake and Lakeport
In Upper Lake Unified, three seats are open. Valerie J. Duncan leads with 774 votes, followed by Sara M. Sanchez with 569 and Ben Guenther with 516. Caitlynn Decker moved into fourth with 417, ahead of incumbent Diane Tomkins Plante with 406. Incumbent Joanne Breton has 299. Guenther leads Decker for the third seat by 99 votes.
In Lakeport, incumbents Brandon Disney and Stacey Mattina were five votes apart after the first count. Disney now leads 562 to 537. Carl Ross Porter, the third candidate, has 324.
What comes next
Lake County expects to post its next results by 5 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 12, the state’s unprocessed ballots report shows.
The county lists 140 ballots waiting on a signature fix, up from 41 on Saturday. Voters who got a notice about a missing or mismatched signature must return the signed statement by 5 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 25.
The county has received 22,125 ballots in all, counted and uncounted. If all of them count, turnout would be about 58% of registered voters. In the 2022 midterm it was 54.79%.
Lake County must send final results to the state by Dec. 4. The state has until Dec. 11 to certify them.
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