Tuesday a bad day here for most write-in candidates

While most write-in candidates did poorly in Tuesday's Hamilton County elections, a race between an incumbent and a challenger for Ward 2 Aurora City Council, where both were write-ins went to the challenger. In that race Esther Bergen, who registered as a write-in candidate just weeks ago, defeated incumbent Nancy Lohrmeyer 52-38 percent. There were 282 write-in votes for Bergen versus just 59 for for the incumbent. Of the 382 total votes cast in that election, 41 write-in votes were designated by election officials as “not assigned.” (Election officials said write-ins are considered not assigned if the name written in does not belong to someone who has filed an affidavit to run as a write-in candidate.) 
In other races for Aurora City Council, in Ward 1 where incumbent Wayne Roblee was facing a challenge by recent write-in candidate Janelle Seim, Roblee received 44 percent of the vote compared with 37 percent for Seim and 23 of the write-in votes were unassigned. The actual vote totals were 435 for Roblee and 371 for Seim. 
Meanwhile in Ward 3, incumbent Mark Dunn won re-election handily with 48 percent of the vote as compared with 37 percent for write-in challenger Carl Smith. The actual vote in that race was 413-297 with 14 votes unassigned. 
A telling statistic in the failure of most write-in candidates to garner enough votes to win is the Lohrmeyer/Bergen race in which a total of only 382 votes were cast in the entire race, as compared to 829 in Ward 1 and 724 in Ward 3. This appears to indicate that voters in Ward 2 were unprepared for seeing no names on the ballot for that ward's city council seat. Another interesting statistic is that 507 ballots in that ward were designated as "under voted" meaning that the space for that election was simply left blank.  
In the race for Dist. 3 county commission, GOP primary winner Jessie Merkel garnered 63 percent of the vote while challenger Ray Simmons, running as a write-in candidate since June, received just 14 percent of the total votes cast. The actual vote totals were 686 for Merkel, 152 for Simmons and 24 were marked unassigned. 
The other local election which included a write-in candidate was also won by the candidate whose name was on the ballot. Ross Beins was elected to another term on the Aurora Airport Authority Board, having garnered 47 percent of the vote while incumbent board member Kasey Wessels who was running as a write-in candidate received 33 percent of the total. The final vote count in that race was Beins 1,192, Wessels 843 and 18 votes were unassigned. 
Elections for school and village boards were also decided in Tuesday's election with the following results:

Village Board Elections
Giltner Board of Trustees: Logan Eastman and Kelli Greathouse, who were both running unopposed to retain their seats on the board, received 151 and 208 votes respectively, to win re-election.
Hampton Board of Trustees: Current board members Dylan Bamesberger and Jared Rojewski each received 203 votes to win re-election. Both were running unopposed. 
Hordville Board of Trustees: Incumbents Rod Blase and Robert Anderson, along with newcomer Benjamin Blase were running for three open seats on the Hordville Board and all were elected. Rod Blase, who is the current chairman of the board, received 48 votes, Anderson had 51 votes and Benjamin Blase received 47 of the 150 total votes cast. 
Marquette Board of Trustees: In Marquette, where there were a total of seven candidates seeking just two seats on the board, the outcome of the election is uncertain pending a possible recount. Incumbent Dennis Saum appears to have lost his seat, while current board chairman Richard Archer is deadlocked with Jerry Jervah. Both candidates received 43 of the 214 votes cast in the election and are tied at 18.22 percent of the vote. Meanwhile, newcomer Vincent White was the top vote-getter with 45 votes for 19.07 percent. Other results included William Gfeller, 8 votes, 3.39 percent;  Kenny Aerni, 24 votes, 10.17 percent; Saum, 14 votes, 5.93 percent and Angela Pierce, 35 votes, 14.83 percent. 
Phillips Board of Trustees: Current board chairman Jim Crawford won his first election to board on Tuesday after filling out an unexpired term. Crawford was one of three candidates running for two open seats on the board. The other candidates were John Briseno and Deanna Weir. Briseno had the most votes with 130 (30 percent of the 357 votes cast) while Crawford came in second with 117 (27 percent) and Weir lost her bid after receiving 98 votes (23 percent). 
Stockham Board of Trustees: Lewis Schlekopf retained his seat on the board after receiving 25 of the 44 votes cast. He was running unopposed for one of three open seats on the board. The other two seats remain unfilled, however, there were 19 votes cast for various write-in candidates.

School Board Elections
Aurora 4R School Board: All three candidates running for the three open seats on the Aurora School Board were elected on Tuesday. Incumbents Dan Pachta and Brock Wyatt received 2,850 and 2,569 votes respectively to win re-election and newcomer to the board, Chad Carlson received 2,752 votes. A total of 8,215 votes were cast in that election.
Giltner School Board: The three incumbents running for re-election to the school board all won their races. Brad Schutt got the most votes with 295 (21 percent), Joseph Happold came in second in the vote tally with 272 (20 percent) and Michael Wilson received 238 votes for 17 percent of the total votes cast. Challenger Amanda Eastman received 186 votes (14 percent). There were also 19 write-in votes in that election. 
Hampton School Board: The three incumbent members of the Hampton School Board all won re-election handily over challenger Mitchell Fagan. The vote totals and percentages were as follows: Derek Klute, 354 votes, 27 percent; Tamara Wiens, 266, 20 percent; Megan Faller, 242, 18 percent and Fagan, 176, 13 percent. A total of 1,044 votes were cast in the school board election with a total of six write-ins.

Large turnout as expected
Predictions of high voter turnout in Tuesday's General Election in Hamilton County turned out to be accurate, as 81 percent of registered voters voted by mail, drop off and at the polls. In all, 5,641 ballots were cast in the county out of a total of 6,963 registered voters. Turnout here was the second highest in the last 12 years. Only the presidential election of 2020 was higher with 82.3 percent of registered voters casting ballots. The lowest turnout (58 percent) was for the mid-term election of 2014. 

Meanwhile, the Secretary of State's office is reporting today that Nebraska’s 2024 General Election had the second-highest number of votes cast in Nebraska’s election history with 934,188 ballots cast. In addition, several thousand early voting and provisional ballots remain to be counted. Preliminary turnout data shows that 73.9 percent of registered Nebraska voters voted in the 2024 General Election. Turnout could inch up slightly as the remaining ballots are counted. 
In the much-watched U.S. presidential race, county voters supported President Donald Trump's re-election in a big way, giving him 78 percent of the vote locally to just 19 percent for Vice President Kamala Harris. Nationally, Trump won 295 electoral votes to 226 for Harris.