Runoff likely in razor-close council race
By Scott Nicholson & Jeff Eason

After a record voter turnout, Tuesday’s Town of Boone election raised almost as many questions as it resolved.

The final make-up of the next town council will likely not be known until next week at the earliest, and a November runoff is likely due to the closeness of the race.

Five candidates finished within 51 votes of each other, making the provisional votes and next Tuesday’s canvass critical in determining the town’s future.

Town council candidate Stephen Phillips, a member of the town’s planning commission, was the top vote getter in unofficial returns, netting 1,062 votes.

Phillips appears safe to win a four-year term runoff, barring any unusual determinations made during the canvass, but he still may face a runoff.

The Board of Elections reported 81 provisional votes had been cast, and little will be resolved until the elections board determines whether those votes are ruled valid.

Incumbents Lynne Mason and Dempsey Wilcox finished second and third, respectively, though both may face challenges as well. Mason collected 1,038 votes and Wilcox got 1,028 votes.

Both Liz Aycock and incumbent Bunk Spann might be eligible to call for a runoff, and both said they would have to see the provisional vote totals before deciding whether to call for a runoff.

However, both said they wanted some perspective on the results before they made any decision. Aycock finished 13 votes behind Wilcox, while incumbent Spann finished 17 votes behind.

On Wednesday, Spann said he would likely call for a runoff but has not made a final decision. Spann said there was no clear mandate from the voters on the future direction of the town and the results showed the sides were evenly divided.

“The voters will ultimately decide what kind of council we have and I have full and complete respect for the voters,” he said, indicating he would analyze where the provisional ballots were cast and how the canvass turns out before making a decision.

With newcomer Aycock trailing Wilcox by a mere 13 votes for the third and final council seat, Democrats who backed her said they were hopeful that could change when the 81 outstanding provisional votes are tallied.

“I worked really hard and I am proud that I got over one thousand votes,” said Aycock. “I’m going to continue to serve the community on the planning task force and other ways.”

Incumbent Loretta Clawson handily won a second term as mayor, getting 57 percent of the vote against challenger Tim Wilson, and she was confident a council that was ideologically divided would still be able to work together.

Clawson acknowledged the council would be politically divided regardless of runoffs, but believed the council would remain what she called progressive. “We already have two progressives on the board, so depending on how the provisional ballots turn out, we will still have a progressive board. I feel very comfortable working with anybody. All the candidates have been nice to me.”

“I’m thrilled about the results,” she added. “I couldn’t be happier. I know that I was outspent in this election but this just shows you that the people control the results, not the money.”

Her 1,222 vote tally was believed to be the most ever cast for a single Boone mayoral candidate.

A record total of 2,199 people voted, depending on the number of provisional ballots certified by the Board of Elections. The canvass is scheduled for next Tuesday at 11 a.m. If eligible, the candidates will have a week after that to call for a runoff.

Phillips said, “I’m honored by the high turnout and the people coming in and demonstrating their support. I’m looking forward to working with the entire board.

Out at the precincts, people at opposite ends of the (political) spectrum were getting along and showing lots of humor.”

Phillips attributed divisive issues, publicity, a large and diverse slate of candidates, and hard-working campaigns as reasons for the high turnout.

Wilcox said the divisiveness had sparked public interest but now it was time for the council members to work together. “It was a very hard-fought campaign,” he said.

“It reflects how split the town is over some of these issues.”

He added that it was a mix of publicity and interest in the issues that led to the record turnout, and said the council would be able to work together even after the hotly contested race.

Run-off contemplation
Mason was pleased with her second-place finish but in the wake of a long campaign was reluctant to contemplate gearing up for a runoff race. “I’m honored to be re-elected. We’ve maintained a progressive council. It’s been a long, intense campaign and I don’t want to think about a runoff right now. That will be decided by other candidates.”

Aside from the closeness of the race, the biggest surprise may have been the record turnout, added by the 800 ballots cast in the early-voting period. The 2,199 votes cast were more than double the number cast in the 2005 race, when 1,214, or 10 percent of registered town voters, went to the polls. This year, 22 percent went to the polls.

PAC Publicity
The high-profile advertising campaign of the political action committee Citizens for Change may have helped stimulate voter interest. The PAC supported Wilson, Wilcox, Phillips and Ethan Dodson, largely because of views the PAC considered pro-growth.

The PAC’s advertising had expressed displeasure with the controversial steep-slope and view-shed ordinances that were adopted by the town council last year. The PAC had raised a reported $44,000, believed to be the most ever for a local election, and also criticized the current council’s water policies and relationship with ASU.

Citizens for Change chairman Jeff Templeton said the PAC was pleased, based on unofficial returns, to add “a qualified and open-minded candidate in Stephen Phillips” and protect Wilcox’s seat on the council, which Templeton said might have been lost if not for the campaign. “I’m most proud of the fact that there was almost two and a half times the turnout over the last election,” Templeton said.

Templeton said the PAC had spent $34,000 and planned to stay active if there were a runoff race, though he said he wasn’t sure if the PAC would continue to be active for elections in the years ahead.

“We feel like we’ve educated the public on many issues,” Templeton said. “I by no means think this is over.”
Templeton said while the PAC regretted Wilson’s loss in the mayoral race, decisions are ultimately made at the council level. He characterized the mayoral position as that of a figurehead. He also said he expected the incumbents to take notice of the outcomes and citizen interest and “work harder to include all segments” when setting policy.

He also alluded to political activist Pam Williamson, whom the PAC’s campaign had lampooned as an engineer driving a train containing Clawson, Mason and Spann as passengers, saying, “This election was about nonpartisan citizens versus the ‘Pam-o-crats.’”

“It’s a brand new game now and it will be different when we get ready for the run-off in November,” Williamson said.

“We survived an onslaught of lies and character assassinations. I hope that the town will never have to experience another negative election like this. As a community, we can’t afford it.”

Results from the two precincts with polling places on the Appalachian State University campus, Boone 2 and Boone 3, showed little difference from those away from campus. Candidates supported by Citizens for Change fell slightly behind in those precincts, and ASU student and council candidate Dodson could not make up enough ground to finish above sixth place, though he received 858 votes overall.

Jeremy Blocker, who proclaimed himself independent when the race began to split between those calling themselves progressives and those backed by Citizens for Change, finished with 226 votes.

Kevin Freeman and Rob Taylor, who had verbally withdrawn from the race even though their names still appeared on the ballot, received 51 and 32 votes, respectively.

Elections director Jane Hodges said her staff would research the provisional votes and present information to the Board of Elections during the canvass, and the board will then determine whether the votes are valid or not. The canvass will be at 11 a.m.

Hodges predicted a runoff race would cost over $10,000, since the last runoff cost $6,700 and precinct worker pay has increased since then. The runoff would be held on Nov. 6.

Party lines drawn
Although the election was not officially a partisan event, you’d never know that by the way members of the local Democratic and Republican parties parted ways after the results were announced Tuesday evening.

Local Democrats and non-partisan supporters, many of whom gathered at Cafe Portofino following the election, said they were pleased with Clawson’s victory over Wilson but were anxious to see what would happen next week. Although partisans on both sides backed a variety of candidates, party lines seemed to be well drawn between a slate of Mason, Clawson, Spann and Aycock against Phillips, Wilcox, Dodson and Wilson.

But most of the post-election talk was of what might change in the very close results for three open Boone Town Council positions once the outstanding provisional votes are tallied this week. Republicans and non-partisans alike who backed Citizens for Change-supported candidates gathered at the Mountainhouse Restaurant and also seemed both pleased yet uneasy with the tenuous status of the election results although the election of Phillips seems a foregone conclusion.

Citizens for Change also backed Dodson, an ASU student running for Town Council who came in sixth with 858 votes.

Although the Citizens for Change did its best to capture the student vote, Democrats fared better in the Boone 2 and Boone 3 precincts, held at the ASU Student Union and Farthing Auditorium, respectively. Watauga Democrats credited their student volunteers for the hard work they put in this semester.

“I’ve been at it since before school started,” said Jeanie Futrelle, an ASU senior and treasurer of the ASU Student Democrats. “I can’t believe that the Citizens for Change said that Boone was against ASU. Two of the council members and Mayor Clawson went to Raleigh to help get funding for the Education Building.

They were for it, just not for how it was presented.

“Liz Aycock graduated from ASU. She loves ASU and works for sustainable development. Bunk Spann was a professor at ASU. Lynne Mason runs the Hospitality House. It is so amazing that ASU voted for them. The students looked beyond the one wedge issue and voted for what was best for Boone.”

Not every partisan toed a party line. In a letter released last week, Phyllis Templeton, mother of CFC chairman Jeff Templeton, pointed out that several Democrats supported CFC candidates and took exception to a column released by the Democrats that castigated CFC-backed candidates. “I and every other registered Democrat should be outraged that the good name of our proud party was so unnecessarily injured by [the column’s] ranting and raving.”

Jason Reagan contributed to this report.