Branch, Hover will take over the seats of ousted incumbents
By Marcy Stamper
Okanogan County will have two new commissioners — a majority on the three-member board — with both Andy Hover and Chris Branch defeating their opponents by healthy margins in the Nov. 8 general election.
With all but 122 ballots tallied as of Monday (Nov. 21), Hover had 52 percent of the vote for District 2 commissioner, while Ashley W. Thrasher had 48 percent. District 2 includes the Methow Valley, Pateros, Brewster, and a portion of the city of Okanogan. Current commissioner Ray Campbell was defeated in the primary.
In District 1, Branch received 55 percent of the vote, while incumbent Sheilah Kennedy drew 45 percent. District 1 covers Omak, most of Okanogan, and the Colville Reservation and southern Okanogan County.
While the board will now have a majority of new members to start the new year, the learning curve for Hover and Branch may not be as steep as it could be. Hover has worked as a retail manager, supervising employees and preparing budgets. Branch has worked for local governments in the county as a community development director and a planner.
Hover is a Republican and Branch is an Independent. County commissioners serve for four years.
Voters in the town of Twisp overwhelmingly backed a 10-year levy for Aero Methow Rescue Service, supporting it by a 44-percent margin, 72 to 28 percent.
Other contests
In other races, Okanogan County voters chose Brad Hawkins as District 12 state senator with 60.5 percent of the vote to 39.5 percent for Jon Wyss. Hawkins will fill the District 12 seat vacated by retiring Sen. Linda Evans Parlette. Hawkins, who served two terms as a representative to the Legislature, beat Wyss by an overall total of 56 to 44 percent. Both are Republicans.
For Hawkins’ old seat, Okanogan County voters overwhelmingly chose Mike Steele over Jerry Paine, giving Steele 72 of the vote to Paine’s 28 percent. Steele beat Paine 60 to 40 percent district-wide. Both are Republicans.
Okanogan County voters returned state Rep. Cary Condotta to the statehouse with 56 percent of the vote, to 44 percent for Democratic challenger Dan Maher. Overall, voters in District 12 favored Republican Condotta over Maher by 63 to 37 percent.
In the race for Okanogan County Public Utility District commissioner for the nonpartisan post for District 3, Jerry Asmussen drew 57.5 percent of the vote, while Aaron Kester got 42.5 percent. Incumbent Ernie Bolz did not seek another term.
In the presidential contest, Okanogan County favored Republican Donald Trump over Democrat Hillary Clinton, although Clinton carried the state 54 percent to 38 percent. Okanogan County voters gave Trump 56 percent of the vote to 37 percent for Clinton. Libertarian Gary Johnson got almost 4 percent of the county’s votes, and Green Party candidate Jill Stein received 1.5 percent.
While all counties in eastern Washington — except Whitman — favored Trump over Clinton, Trump won by a bigger margin in 10 counties than in Okanogan County (from a high of 72 percent in Lincoln County to 61 percent in Ferry County). Seven races were closer.
Contrary to reports of many people abstaining from the presidential race, almost 17,000 Okanogan County voters — all but 4 percent — chose a candidate. There were 228 write-ins in the county for president as of Nov. 14.
The breakdown of votes by precinct in the Methow Valley (from Methow to Mazama) was somewhat different from the rest of the county. In valley precincts, Thrasher got about 370 more votes than Hover out of a total of 3,260. The Methow Valley was more in line with the District 1 race, with only the Methow precinct favoring Kennedy over Branch. The Methow Valley chose Clinton over Trump by 650 votes.
High turnout
The election drew a near-record turnout in the county, with more than 79 percent of registered voters — almost 18,000 — casting a ballot, 1 percentage point more than usual in a presidential election, according to Mila Jury, the county’s election supervisor. The high turnout, along with a large number of ballots that were submitted online by military and overseas voters, meant that tabulating all the votes took longer than usual, said Jury.
It was also a lengthy ballot, with 27 offices for election and 10 initiatives and ballot measures. “The process can’t be rushed. It’s the tortoise and the hare, and we’re the tortoise,” said Jury.
The county’s election staff had been over their heads after voting closed but, by the end of last week, “we’re getting down to our ankles,” she said.
Ballot tabulators work in teams of two. The county has two teams and room in the office for only one scanning station. When ballots come into the auditor’s office, they’re sorted, grouped by batch and counted before the signatures can be verified. The ballots are put in secure storage until it’s time to open and scan the envelopes, according to Okanogan County Auditor Laurie Thomas.
In addition, the teams inspect each ballot for stray marks, spills and tears that could interfere with an accurate reading by the scanning machine.
The teams stagger their tasks, with one team opening and inspecting ballots while the other team scans and resolves them by inspecting each scanned image for over-votes, under-votes and write-ins, which have to be processed manually. Then the teams swap jobs.
Once each ballot has been resolved, the batch of ballots is saved to a memory card to be tallied later by a different computer.
The 200 ballots filed electronically by overseas voters have to be duplicated on paper so they can be read by the scanning equipment. Duplicating the ballots is a meticulous process that involves one team member reading the voters’ choices while the other one fills in the rectangles. Then they switch and double-check, said Jury.
The teams process between 800 and 1,100 ballots a day, said Jury.
Initiatives
Okanogan County voters said “no,” by 55 to 45 percent, to increasing the minimum wage and providing paid sick leave. The statewide measure passed 57.5 to 42.5 percent.
Okanogan County voters were in sync with others in Washington in rejecting a proposal that would have allowed citizens to use “democracy credits” to contribute to political campaigns. Okanogan County rejected the measure 61 percent to 39 percent, while the state turned it down 54 to 46 percent.
By 52 to 48 percent, the county supported a measure that would allow police and family members to obtain court orders to temporarily prevent firearms access by persons exhibiting mental illness or violent behavior. That measure passed 69.5 percent to 30.5 percent statewide.
An initiative that increases the penalties for identity theft and consumer fraud targeted at vulnerable individuals drew wide support from 68.5 percent of county voters. It passed with 70.5 percent of votes statewide.
The measure that would have imposed an emission tax on fossil fuels proved very unpopular with Okanogan County voters, who rejected it 71.5 to 28.5 percent. The state also rejected it, but by a smaller margin of 59 to 41 percent.
The election will be certified on Nov. 29.
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VOTE TOTALS
As of Monday, Nov. 21
Okanogan County Commissioner, District 1
Sheilah Kennedy (R) 7,278 45 percent
Chris Branch (I) 8,981 55 percent
Okanogan County Commissioner, District 2
Andy Hover (R) 8,406 52 percent
Ashley Thrasher (None) 7,842 48 percent
Okanogan County PUD
Commissioner, District 3
Jerry D. Asmussen 8,038 57.5 percent
Aaron Kester 5,929 42.5 percent
Town of Twisp
Proposition 1, Emergency Medical levy
Yes 295 72 percent
No 116 28 percent
12th Legislative District
State Senator
District-wide
Brad Hawkins (R) 29,547 56 percent
Jon Wyss (R) 23,314 44 percent
Okanogan County
Brad Hawkins 4,302 60.5 percent
Jon Wyss 2,809 39.5 percent
State Representative, District 1
District-wide
Cary Condotta (R) 35,312 63 percent
Dan Maher (D) 20,616 37 percent
Okanogan County
Cary Condotta 4,318 56 percent
Dan Maher 3,440 44 percent
State Representative, District 2
District-wide
Mike Steele (R) 29,143 60 percent
Jerry Paine (R) 19,337 40 percent
County
Mike Steele 4,491 72 percent
Jerry Paine 1,724 28 percent
