A five-hour hand count of ballots Friday afternoon confirmed that Lori Lalouette-Crawford will be the new Marion County commissioner for District 1. The final count revealed that Republican Lalouette-Crawford received 678 votes to 675 votes for independent Craig Dodd, who asked for the recount at his personal expense. Write-in candidate Donna Klose received 113 votes.
Tina Spencer, county election officer and clerk, administered the recount process, which actually was carried out by a board of three bipartisan registered voters from District 2: Eileen Sieger, Anita Brookens and Ruth Lange.
Friday?s recount — which is expected to be routinely approved by the county commission at next Monday?s meeting — should conclude an unusual election process for the 1st District seat.
It began when incumbent commissioner Roger Fleming announced on the filing deadline day that he would not be seeking relection. That meant potential successors would need to use alternate strategies to get their names before the voters.
Lalouette-Crawford and Donald Ewert ran as write-in candidates for the Republi?can nomination in the Aug. 5 primary, while Dodd qualified for the general-election ballot as an independent candidate by using the certification process. Lalouette-Crawford prevailed over Ewert in the primary, 191-118.
At the end of election day, Nov. 4, Dodd was leading Lalouette-Crawford, 670-668, with about 22 ballots needing to be reviewed for various reasons.
Following the election canvass at the Nov. 10 Marion County Board of Commissioners meeting, the result was reversed: Lalouette-Crawford was credited with a one-vote win over Dodd, 676-675.
