Lee County voter participation strong in Tuesday primary election

LEESBURG — Lee County voters will return to the polls for one local primary runoff election after a Tuesday election in which 35 percent of residents cast ballots by early, absentee and in-person voting.

The 35 percent turnout was fairly strong for a primary election, Lee County Elections Supervisor Veronica Johnson said.

In the only race in the county with more than two candidates, neither of the three candidates in the District 4 Lee County School Board race received a majority of votes in the nonpartisan race.

Clay Kile and Jamie McDowell, both of Leesburg, will be on the ballot for the Aug. 11 runoff election. Kile received 502 votes on Tuesday, followed by McDowell with 414. Kristina Paul finished with 400 votes.

In the other school board race in District 2, incumbent Claire Lang came in first with 812 votes. Challenger Neil Wingfield received 564 votes.

Incumbent Lee County Probate Court Judge Melanie Gahring easily won another four-year term with 5,353 votes to 1,862 for challenger Wayne Baltzell, and incumbent District 5 County Commissioner George Wall outpolled political newcomer Jason Burnett 678-414.

And after the original March 24 election was postponed, Leesburg finally got around to selecting a new mayor on Tuesday. Billy Breeden came out on top with 347 votes to 182 for Michael Revell.

Despite more than 3,000 residents in the county casting absentee ballots, a good number still turned out on election day, Johnson said.

“It was busy,” she said. “We had a lot of absentee ballots that had to be canceled out where people requested absentee ballots and decided to vote in person.”

Voters were asked to observe social distancing to reduce the risk of spread of the coronavirus, and the number of voting machines was reduced.

“We had lines, where we never had lines before,” Johnson said. “We had less equipment. We were spacing people out.

“I don’t think people had to wait a terrible length of time. We did everything to make it as fast as we could.”

In addition to reducing the number of voting machines, there also were less poll workers than usual as some decided to stay home due to the threat of Covid-19.

“We had a few,” Johnson said. “I respect their decision. I look forward to their coming back and working with us in the future.”

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