Challenger is within recount range.
Chris Henry
chenry@kitsapsun.com
PORT ORCHARD
Cindy Lucarelli, challenging long-time incumbent Carolyn Powers,
for Port Orchard City Council position 2, moved within recount
range in unofficial results Thursday. The two candidates are now
separated by 10 votes.
Powers has held a whisker of a lead since the election Nov. 3. She
was besting Lucarelli by .58 percentage points as of Nov. 9
In revised results, released Thursday afternoon by the Kitsap
County Auditor, Powers, with 1,207 votes, had 49.83 percent of the
total vote. Lucarelli had 1,197 votes for 49.42 percent of the
vote. That .41 percentage point difference puts Lucarelli within
the range for an automatic recount, triggered under state law by a
margin of less than half a percentage point.
There are currently 18 write-in votes.
Results of the election will not be certified until Tuesday, and
Kitsap County elections manager Dolores Gilmore cautioned that
things still could change. The county has a total of 14 challenged
ballots received from the City of Port Orchard. These are unsigned
ballots or ballots in which the signature does not match up with
the voter registration. Voters have the chance to verify their
signature by affidavit or in person, but it must be done by Monday
afternoon. There are also military votes that could arrive before
the final count, Gilmore said.
Powers is on a trip out of the country and was unavailable for
comment.
Lucarelli is encouraged and eager to see the final count
Tuesday.
“I have nothing to lose at this point,” she said. “It’s very
exciting for me. I can’t wait to see what happens. … Hope springs
eternal.”
Lucarelli is having a bit of deja vu. In 2007, she came within 3.12
percentage points of beating incumbent John Clauson, who has been
on the council for more than 26 years. Powers was appointed to the
council in 1988 to fulfill an unexpired term and has been reelected
five times.
