BY BRANDY TUZON BOYD
THE NATOMAS BUZZ | @natomasbuzz
Incumbent Scott Dosick and first-time school board candidate Ericka Harden are vying for the third Natomas Unified School District school board seat.
What appeared earlier in the week to be an incumbent sweep for three seats on the Natomas Unified School District school board, is now a close race for third place.
According to Sacramento County election results updated Friday afternoon, incumbent Micah Grant’s Election Day lead continues to widen as ballots are counted. Grant is now 1,361 votes ahead of second place finisher Dr. Susan Heredia.
But as of Nov. 13, only 49 votes separate incumbent Scott Dosick and first-time candidate Ericka Harden.
“The numbers are trending in a good direction, but every vote must be counted,” Dosick said on Nov. 6 when his Election Day lead over Harden widened from 260 votes to 392 votes.
Dosick continued to lead Harden in a vote count update posted by Sacramento County elections officials on Nov. 10, but that gap narrowed considerably with today’s update. News which came as a surprise to Harden when contacted by The Natomas Buzz.
“It appears third place is still up for grabs,” said Harden. “I’m still in this race and excited to be here.”
Sacramento County officials had anticipated election results would not be final for at least two weeks due to record-breaking voter turnout.
Grant’s campaign declared victory on Nov. 6 when election returns solidified his first place finish.
“My team thinks it’s OK to say I’m going to be serving another term,” said Grant, whose lead over Heredia continued to widen with each vote update.
Heredia, who came in second in the 10-way race for three school board seats, will be serving her sixth term.
“I’m extremely grateful and humbled that the community has reelected me again to … represent their children in school and the interests of parents,” Heredia said Friday. “I’m looking forward to working as hard as I always have for my constituents.”
Election results posted Nov. 13 indicate at least 73.53% voter turnout for the 48,090 registered voters who reside within the Natomas Unified School District’s boundaries.
Each voter was allowed to vote for up to three school board candidates at the polls.
The latest election results, however, show nearly 35% or more than one-third of these votes were not cast. As of Friday, there were 36,814 undervotes in the Natomas Unified school board race. This means voters chose only one or two candidates, or none at all.
“Undervotes are the number of votes that could’ve gone to a candidate, but that the voter decided to leave blank,” said Courtney Bailey-Kanelos, Sacramento County registrar of voters.
Bailey-Kanelos said the local races where there are multiple candidates are most impacted by undervotes.
“We’ve had some very close races where one vote really makes a difference,” said Bailey-Kanelos.
The nextelection update is scheduled for Tuesday, Nov. 17 with 51,699 ballots left to tally countywide. How many of those ballots may impact the Natomas race was not known at press time.
Source: Sacramento County Election
[…] At one point during the vote count, Dosick led Harden by 392 votes, but that gap narrowed to 49 vote… […]