Michael Woody, Jim Dantona neck-and-neck in race for District 2 SLO County supervisor
Michael Erin Woody held a slim early lead in a tight race for District 2 San Luis Obispo County supervisor after the second release of vote totals on Tuesday night.
As of 10:01 p.m., with the initial count of early mail-in ballots and 5.9% of precincts reporting, Woody led the race with 50.9% of the vote over Jim Dantona, who was not far behind with 49.1% of the vote.
The two were separated by 102 votes.
The candidate who wins more than 50% of the vote captures the seat.
Following the first vote results, updated totals will continue to drop about every two hours until all poll ballots have been counted, according to Erin Clausen, the public information officer for the Clerk-Recorder’s Office.
The two-candidate race is between Dantona, a local business leader and Democrat, and Woody, a Morro Bay engineer not affiliated with a political party. The contenders are vying to represent the county’s North Coast, includes communities from Los Osos to the Monterey County line.
At a primary night watch party at Niffy’s Merrimaker in Los Osos, Dantona told The Tribune there were still plenty of ballots to count.
“The first batch basically shows us even, so we’re gonna wait to see,” Dantona said. “Obviously people were holding their ballots for a long time, there’s a lot more to count, so it’ll be a long night.”
Woody, who was hosting a primary night party at The Benedict in Morro Bay, said he was proud to run a clean, competitive campaign without resorting to any negativity or mudslinging.
“If we did nothing else tonight, even if this race doesn’t win, when it’s all said and done, we proved that point first and foremost,” he said. “Now, if we can win the whole thing, then politics has changed for more than a generation here in San Luis Obispo County.”
The winning candidate will replace Supervisor Bruce Gibson, who announced last May that he would not seek reelection in 2026.
The deadline for county elections officials to certify election results is July 2.
This story was originally published June 2, 2026 at 8:43 PM.
