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Monrovia Absentee and Provision Count Completed with same results
Monrovia Weekly Apr 23, 2015
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Tom Adams celebrates his lead Tuesday evening at Jakes – Photos by Terry Miller
By Susan Motander
The remaining valid absentee ballots(known correctly as Votes by Mail or VBM) along with the valid provisional ballots were counted this morning with no substantial change in the outcome of the election. Tom Adams has been elected mayor and Becky Shevlin and Gloria Crudgington will fill out the remainder of the council.
With 23.1% of the registered voters participating, Adams received 2286 votes to incumbent Mary Ann Lutz’s 2182. Adams had a lead of 184 votes over incumbent Mary Ann Lutz on election night, the gap was narrowed to only 104.
On election night Gloria Crudgington seemed to have received the highest vote count of the eight candidates for City Council (there were nine names listed on the ballot, but Tom Gulley had withdrawn from the election, but not in time to have his name removed from the ballot). That night it appeared that the incumbent Becky Shevlin has received the seconded highest number of votes. While both Crudgington and Shevlin will be seated, Shevlin pulled ahead of Crudington by 63 votes. Austin gained more votes than Crudgington in the final votes counted, but the gain was not enough to change the outcome of the election.
This final vote will be certified at the city council meeting on May 5. Asked why the vote was not considered official at this time, City Clerk Alice Atkins explained that one precinct’s regular ballots and one precinct’s VBM ballots still needed to be recounted manually.
Dan Pabich of Martin and Chapman, the company that supplies the city’s ballot counting machines, explained this manual count was done to verify the validity of the ballot counter. “It is very rare that the manual count is not in agreement with the machine’s count,” he said. In his experience, Pabich said this usually occurs when there is a problem with the ballots processing such as failure to remove the ballot stubs causing the machine to jam. There were no such jams of the machinery on election night in Monrovia;
The following Counts will be verified and the election certified at the next council meeting when the new members of the council will be sworn in.
Mayor Election Night* Prov & Last VBN** Final Count
Leonard Holen 131 26 157
Mary Ann Lutz 1738 444 2182
Tom Adams 1924 362 2286
City Council
Clifford De Costa 285 80 365
Chris Ziegler 537 146 683
Tom Gulley 71 17 88
Steve Grollnek 88 11 99
Robert Parry 1237 234 1471
Gloria Crudgington 1591 291 1882
Scott Austin 1338 315 1653
Jordan Kittleson 427 102 529
Becky Shevlin 1580 365. 1945
* includes VBM received on or before 4/10
** includes VBM received after 4/10
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