Farmer leads Robinette in tight race for third CCSD seat

Update: This story has been updated Thursday morning, Nov. 17, to reflect vote totals from Wednesday afternoon’s count by the San Luis Obispo Clerk-Recorder’s Office.

The fight for the third contested seat on the Cambria Community Services Board of Directors continued to be up in the air Wednesday, with challenger Harry Farmer and incumbent Gail Robinette still locked in a tight race.

Incumbent Amanda Rice remained the overall top vote-getter through Wednesday afternoon’s updated count with 19 percent of the vote, followed by incumbent Greg Sanders with 17.7 percent.

Farmer continued to lead Robinette, the current board president, for the third seat by 24 votes — a five-vote increase from the margin after Monday’s count — 1,307 (16.3 percent) to 1,284 (16 percent). According to the San Luis Obispo Clerk-Recorder’s Office, 386 ballots remained to be counted as of Wednesday afternoon, including 227 mail-in ballots, 109 provisional ballots and 50 ballots cast election night that had yet to be processed.

Counting was scheduled to resume at 1 p.m. Friday, Nov 18. Clerk-Recorder Tommy Gong said this past Monday was the last day his office could receive ballots by mail. He said many of the vote-by-mail ballots had been dropped off at the polls without an envelope, and many of these remained to be counted. Other voters were mailed one ballot, asked for a replacement but then turned in the original — which had been suspended — instead.

“We would reinstate that (suspended) ballot and count it, since the second one never came back,” Gong said. He said that, in this election, “there were a lot of reregistrations that caused a second ballot to go out to the voter.”

Some ballots submitted at the polls also remained to be counted, with the delay caused by things such as a tear in the ballot or an overvote, Gong added. He hoped to have the entire count done by Dec. 2, before the Dec. 6 deadline for certification.

CCSD

In the CCSD race, Sanders and Robinette campaigned together, with many of many of those who endorsed one also endorsing the other. Challengers Dewayne Lee and Tom Kirkey, who finished fourth and fifth in the voting, respectively, also campaigned together some prior to the election.

Lee, at 13.6 percent, and Kirkey, at 12 percent, both had only slim mathematical chances as of Wednesday. Lee was 216 votes behind third-place Farmer, and Kirkey was 345 behind with 386 still to be counted. Some of the same voters who publicly endorsed Farmer also endorsed Lee and Kirkey.

Rice’s lead over the rest of the candidates had widened Wednesday to 102 votes from 75 on Election Night.

Still, she said, “Anybody’s win in this kind of election should not be considered in isolation. We don’t know in what combinations of candidates were voted for, and the five-person board acts as one entity, unlike president or governor or even congressional offices.

“I don’t hear one message being sent,” she said. “If all three incumbents had been re-elected by a wide margin or if two or more challengers had won by a large margin, perhaps I could see a message. What it does seem to say is Cambria is full of diverse independent thinkers — voters who responded to the candidates who reached out to them.”

Rice identified the biggest challenges ahead as prioritizing all infrastructure and long-term planning, and “figuring out how we will pay for it all.” She said the board must “push toward better accountability from the general manager and keep a sharper eye on the budget.”

CCHD

Meanwhile, there was nothing uncertain about the Cambria Community Healthcare District race, which was locked up on election night. Incumbent Barbara Bronson Gray and challenger Shirley Bianchi each received more than twice as many votes as their nearest competitor, incumbent Kristi Jenkins, to claim the two four-year contested seats.

A total of 419 votes remained to be processed in that race, but that figure is not enough to change the outcome, even if they were to all go to a single candidate.

Bronson Gray, who received more than 37 percent of the vote, said the significant margin of victory “shows the breadth and depth of the community’s support for what I stand for.”

“It’s always easier to accomplish things when you are confident you are doing what people want, and they, in turn, have confidence in you,” she said. “But as opportunities and challenges come up, we need to continue to keep actively reaching out to the community and listening to their expressed needs.”

Bronson Gray and Bianchi both advocated recruiting more medical services to town during the campaign, based on a desire for such services expressed in a survey of district residents.

“Voters were obviously unhappy with the direction the majority of the CCHD board had gone,” said Bianchi, who received 34.7 percent of the vote. “Even though the (Health) Professionals Committee survey indicated that a great many residents of the district wanted more health care, for some reason the majority of the board chose to downplay their wishes.”

The other two candidates in the race were board President Kristi Jenkins at 17.4 percent of the vote and Jerry Wood with 10.7 percent of the vote. Wood already serves in an appointed seat on the board and will continue to serve out that two-year term following the election. Tuesday’s vote was for a separate, four-year term.

Recent board meetings had been marked by contention, both among board members themselves and between the board and audience members.

Bianchi said she wanted to improve that climate: “Within the organization itself, our first challenge will be to bring civility to the board,” she said. “Nothing can be accomplished if the rancor continues.”

She said she wants a digital X-ray, a full-service lab and more doctors and nurse practitioners for the community. She plans to work to encourage “Dignity Health and Tenet to bring their expertise, personnel and facilities to the North Coast.”

CUSD

Both incumbents, each of whom had been appointed to a vacant seat in the most recent term, won election to the Coast Unified School District Board of Trustees.

As of Wednesday, Tiffany Silva had received the highest number of votes for the four-year seat on the board at 24.5 percent, just six votes ahead of challenger Dennis Rightmer, at 24.4 percent. Silva, Rightmer and Samuel Shalhoub (21.5 percent) had each earned enough votes as of Wednesday to clinch the three open four-year seats on the board. The three had campaigned together.

Eileen Roach and Eric Endersby were the other two candidates for that seat.

Lee McFarland, another appointed incumbent, won the fourth seat, a two-year term, although his only opponent on the ballot, Elizabeth Weatherly, withdrew from the election early in the campaign. McFarland had received 51.8 percent of the vote as of Wednesday, while Weatherly still managed to garner 47.4 percent. McFarland was 169 votes ahead with 386 outstanding ballots remaining to be counted Wednesday.

“I’m so happy to have been the top vote-getter,” Silva said. “I feel the residents spoke through their votes. I’m so proud to be the representation for our communities. I feel the voters responded accordingly to our slate and the needs of the students in our district. ... We have an amazing group of children that make this job so easy.”

SSCSD

In race for three seats on the San Simeon Community Services District board, incumbent Alan M. Fields continued to lead Wednesday with 72 votes, followed by incumbent Daniel Williams and incumbent Mary M. McGuire with 55 each. Incumbent Leroy Price was fourth with 51 votes.

As many as 21 votes remained to be counted, although the Clerk-Recorder’s Office noted that, in this case, the district may not be on all unprocessed and provisional ballots.

This story was originally published November 15, 2016 at 5:12 PM with the headline "Farmer leads Robinette in tight race for third CCSD seat."