BRISTOL, Va. — The final outcome of Tuesday’s Bristol Virginia City Council election should be revealed by mid-day today after election officials count more than 1,400 write-in votes.
About 1,500 city voters went to the polls Tuesday and cast a remarkable 1,421 write-in votes for the two City Council seats up for grabs. Three men — Harry Anderson II, Kevin Mumpower and David Trotter — ran write-in campaigns and mathematically two of them could win those seats. The city’s Electoral Board will review each ballot individually during today’s 10 a.m. canvass.
Of the two candidates whose names appeared on the ballot, challenger Doug Fleenor received 644 unofficial votes and is in the lead for one spot. Voters gave incumbent Councilman Guy Odum 458 votes, likely not enough to claim a third term.
“That is an astounding number of write-in votes,” General Registrar Penny Limburg said Tuesday night. “It’s all so very unofficial. There is no way to know for sure. You’ll either have two write-ins get in or one write-in and Doug Fleenor.”
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This apparently marks the second consecutive election where a write-in candidate will win an available council seat. Current Mayor Archie Hubbard waged a successful write-in bid, getting about 800 votes in 2014.
Sitting in his front yard Tuesday, Fleenor declined to claim victory.
“Common sense can solve a lot of problems and I want to be a common sense representative of the people, if it turns out I’m elected,” Fleenor said.
A 57-year-old attorney, Fleenor said he “loves the city.” He has served five years on the BVU Authority board of directors and been a vocal critic of past BVU activities. He approached local law enforcement with information about potential wrongdoing there in late 2013.
“If I am elected after the raw count, the first thing I’m going to do is ask the City Council to consolidate our economic development efforts with Washington County and Smyth County and the towns in Washington County and Smyth County,” Fleenor said. “To see what we can do collectively to getting good manufacturing jobs here.”
Fleenor said his second priority would be finding a way to address the city’s aging, overcrowded jail.
Odum said he wishes the eventual winners well.
“I am at perfect peace with this,” Odum said Tuesday night. “Congratulations to those that won.”
The winners will be sworn in July 1.
There was no suspense in the School Board races where unopposed incumbents Tyrone Foster and Ronald Cameron received 1,120 and 923 votes, respectively. In the special election to fill the remaining two years of former Chairwoman Beth Rhinehart’s term, Steve Fletcher received 1,085 unofficial votes. Fletcher was appointed to fill that spot last fall.
Turnout began slowly but gained steam throughout the day.
“I’m pleased with the turnout. It came up to 1,500, which is what we had last election. It’s nice to see a better than expected turnout and obviously voters,” Limburg said.
The canvass will be held in the City Hall council chambers and is expected to take about two hours to complete.