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Election officials in Logan and Champaign counties will likely have to recount ballots in the West Liberty-Salem School Board race, but all other outcomes reported after the Nov. 7 general election remain unchanged.
The Logan County Board of Elections met earlier this week to certify results, but local election officials sought advice from the Ohio Secretary of State’s office regarding how to determine if recounts are required in races with multiple seats to be elected. The reply had not been received by Tuesday afternoon.
In races with only one seat available, recounts are triggered if two candidates are within 0.5 percent of the total number of ballots cast. When multiple seats are up for election, the number of votes for declared winners can be subtracted from the total number of ballots cast, Logan County Election Co-director Adam Brannon reports.
In the West Liberty-Salem race, David Cline and Chuck Buck were declared clear winners and their 799 and 792 respective votes can be discarded. The next most votes, 741, went to Tim Lamb with write-in candidate Julie Cole earning 728. The final two candidates were Dixie Kopus with 546 and Trey Richardson, 541.
The 13 votes that separates Lamb and Cole is slightly more than 0.5 percent of the 2,556 total votes cast for the four remaining candidates.
The results of two other races — a Liberty Township trustee and an Indian Lake School Board member — were also very close, but because the races involved multiple open seats, the difference between the candidates was not close enough to trigger a recount.
The Logan County Board of Elections will likely recount its votes at 8:30 a.m. Thursday, Nov. 30.