April 17, 2008 08:58 pm
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By Susan Redden
sredden@joplinglobe.com
CARTHAGE, Mo. — A recount Thursday made no change in the numbers or outcome in the race for mayor in Oronogo.
Bob Pearish was told that his three-vote margin was confirmed after workers in the county clerk’s office recounted ballots cast in the April 8 election.
Pearish received 109 votes, and Bruce Richardson had 106 votes. Richardson requested the recount, and the two men stood side-by-side to observe the counting in the county clerk’s office in Carthage.
Bonnie Earl, Jasper County clerk, announced the unchanged results after the recount. She noted that Richardson was entitled to the recount, by law, because of the narrow margin of victory.
“It’s fine,” Richardson said of the outcome. “I wasn’t even going to ask for a recount, but a lot of people called me and asked me to do it.”
Pearish said he was pleased with the outcome, adding, “It’s going to be a learning curve.”
The mayor’s race was his first run for public office, he said.
Richardson, a former city councilman, had been serving as mayor since December, when the council elected him to the office after Mayor Millie West resigned.
There also was no change in the vote count for others on the ballot. Bucky Flathers received 8 votes, Steve VanSlyke 11 votes. Norman West, husband of the former mayor, filed as a write-in candidate and garnered 56 votes.
For the recount, election judges fed all the ballots cast in the two Oronogo precincts back through the optical scanner and manually counted the write-in votes. Though it was a nonpartisan election, one Democratic election judge and one Republican were brought in to do the recount.
A couple of residents who did not file as write-in candidates received a vote each, and Mickey Mouse got one write-in vote.
Meeting set
The Oronogo City Council will meet at 7 p.m. Monday. The session was delayed one week pending results of the vote recount.
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