run-off spots for Metro
presidency all wrapped up.
(Photo © J. Maus)
It’s election night and, while I haven’t done tons of coverage on all the races, I thought folks might want a place to chime in about what’s going on.
Many of the races have been decided, but there’s a tight battle brewing for who will be in the runoff for Metro president. Bob Stacey currently leads with 37% with Tom Hughes in second at 31%. Rex Burkholder is trailing Hughes by about 1,400 votes.
UPDATE: Looks like Stacey has one of the spots wrapped up. Hughes is likely to get the other one.
In the other interesting race, City Commissioner Dan Saltzman has avoided a runoff by getting 55% of the vote so far. His closest rival is Mary Volm with just 12%. Jesse Cornett has only garnered 6.9% of the vote so far. More updates are due from Multnomah County Elections Office at 9:00.
Find out what’s happening at all the local election night parties via our friends at The Portland Mercury.
Stay tuned for full wrap-up and look-ahead tomorrow morning.
Thanks for reading.
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I’m glad to hear about Saltzmann. Jesse Cornett lost me after that onslought of misleading “Sewer money shouldn’t pay for bike lanes” ads. On MTBR, no less! That and his negative reply to a question about mountain bikes in Forest Park. Nick Fish, of course, handily won his race.
Not so glad to hear about Burkholder.
I put Jesse on the spot at our neighborhood association meeting, saying I would allow him his stance on the sewer money but asking him about his take on the relative equity of cycling infrastructure spending vis-a-vis the “gas tax myth” . . . he merely spouted off some tired pro-bike platitudes. Glad to see he was shut down.
Not so good news: As of 10:08pm, Dick Schouten for Washington County Commission chairman, is losing to Duyck.
Tough gal Betty Bode for Beaverton City Council, Position 2, wins by 6 points. (she’s on the Beav Bike Advisory Committee.)
election results for Washington County
I heard Bob Stacey at the Joe Rowe’s gathering for him last month. I sprung a few questions on him. He was sharp, knowledgeable, and answered everything straight-up. And I liked very much what he said about the CRC and other transportation systems.
I talked Rex at the Metro “Bike There” map unveiling last Thursday, and he dodged a series of questions about the CRC. I was surprised and disappointed with his replies, saying that he hadn’t followed the process carefully, that the total number of lanes wasn’t important. He didn’t know what the current CRC, inc. proposals were, etc. And he didn’t seem interested in the information I shared with him from my attendance at 10+ CRC Bike/Ped Advisory Cmte meetings…
Bob earned his victory, Rex earned his loss.
CRC, inc. should take note. Listen carefully. Answer forthrightly. Don’t ram stuff down peoples’ throats…
Ted Buehler
I am so happy that Bob Stacey will be in the runoff and that Burkholder won’t. Stopping the CRC is critical to keeping Portland a sane place to live.
Electing Bob Stacey is critical in ending this 12 lane CRC nightmare.
wsbob,
thanks for that comment. i had not been tracking that race. Wow. I thought Schouten would win. I don’t know Andy Duyck, but I suppose it’s time to meet him.
Schouten would have been a force for active transportation.. I hope Duyck understands its importance as well.
Bob is a good guy and worthy of your support! He’s got mine.
Bob had and will continue to have my support as we go into the run off. And while metro is about more than the CRC/getting it right on that issue, I appreciate that he took a stand on it in his ads, campaign.
Go Stacey! w00t!!
I should say that I’ll be happy to vote for Bob Stacey at this point. If one views Stacey and Burkholder as splitting the progressive vote versus Hughes holding the other vote, then the runoff should be a little more comfortable for Stacey.
Correct Charley. He also upset me when he came to the Portland Carfree happy hour (by car) and talked about how he just couldn’t bike in his Lents Neighborhood. I have more than a few fiends that would disagree.
And Stacy… Woot woot. I’m very happy to have someone willing to stand up and stop the CRC. Rex lost my vote when he stopped listening to Portland residents.
I was referring to Comment #1 and Jesse Cornett with my Lents comment
While I voted for Rex, Stacey clearly ran a better campaign. Rex’s TV spot was embarrassing.
I’ll be voting for Stacey in the runoff without question, but I’ll be watching for how well he can build consensus and bring groups to compromise as an elected official… as I understand, his experience is somewhat limited in this area.
Woo Hoo!
Go Bob Stacey!
Stacey, FTW!!
Saltzman’s seat: As always, it helps if the candidate demonstrates an understanding of the issues and doesn’t resort to histrionics. If Jesse actually picked a theme and ran with it, or actually backed up his statements with real facts, I believe he would have garnered more votes. Instead, he picked at any possible wedge issue and opposed whatever Saltzman did. Cornett lost my vote when he made a factless argument that council’s approval of $20 million for bioswales was somehow an unjust use of tax payer money for bicycle infrastructure. It simply wasn’t. And that’s the sort of mistake that demonstrates a poor grasp of the issues.
Jesse, if you run for election again, and decide to be the “bicycling” candidate, you should really come to the table with some awesome, innovative ideas next time. Base your arguments on facts (like how bike infrastructure actually pays us back, for instance), and you’ll easily double your votes.