LAKEPORT, Calif. – The Board of Supervisors will meet in a special evening session next Tuesday to take up, among other things, the final canvass for the June 3 election.
The board will meet beginning at 6 p.m. Tuesday, July 1, in the board chambers on the first floor of the Lake County Courthouse.
Along with the final canvass results, the board also will have the first reading of a proposed medical marijuana dispensaries ordinance.
Registrar of Voters Diane Fridley has until 5 p.m. Tuesday to complete the count, according to the Secretary of State's Office.
Fridley's office is the last of the 58 county election offices statewide to complete the final count for the June 3 primary, according to the unprocessed ballot posted by the California Secretary of State's Office on Friday.
The last report Fridley's office gave the state on its count was on the afternoon of June 10, when it reported that 5,263 absentees, 743 provisionals and 47 “other” ballots – defined by the Secretary of State's Office as those that are damaged that the machine could not read and had to be remade, and ballots diverted by optical scanners for further review – were uncounted, for a total of 6,053 ballots total.
With several key county races having tight margins, increased pressure has been on Fridley as she has worked to certify the final election results during this year's 28-day primary canvass period.
After election night, sheriff's candidate Brian Martin appeared to have won the race outright with 51.4 percent of the vote, compared to incumbent Frank Rivero's 25.9 percent and retired Clearlake Police Chief Bob Chalk's 22.7 percent.
Martin needs at least 50 percent of the vote plus one additional vote to avoid having a November runoff with Rivero.
The race for assessor-recorder also is tight, with Richard Ford leading with 50.1 percent of the vote, followed by Sorhna Li Jordan with 26.6 percent and Logan Weiper with 23.3 percent, based on the initial tally completed early June 4.
Other close races include those for the seats to represent District 2 and District 3 on the Board of Supervisors.
Incumbent Jeff Smith emerged on election night leading in the District 2 race, with 45 percent of the vote to 27.9 and 27.1 percent for challengers Jeri Spittler and Joyce Overton, respectively. Only 11 votes separated Spittler's and Overton's placement in the initial count.
In the race for District 3, Jim Steele was well ahead of the field coming out of election night with 32.4 percent of the vote, with the race being for second place for the November runoff.
The early count indicates John Brosnan, with 19.2 percent, is in second place, followed by Marv Butler with 17 percent, Herb Gura with 14.8 percent, James Brown with 11.2 percent and Mark Currier with 5.4 percent.
There also is anticipation for the final count on the referendum Measure N, which would implement regulations for medical marijuana cultivation.
The election night initial count had the measure in the lead with a “yes” vote of 52.6 percent to “no” votes totaling 47.4 percent.
As a result of the continuing canvass, Lake County is in the position of deciding the tight state controller's race, which has Democrats John Pérez and Betty Yee in a statistical dead heat to represent the Democratic Party on the November ballot.
Secretary of State Debra Bowen's office reported on Friday that with all counties – except for Lake – having submitted final canvass results, Yee is leading with 877,263 to Pérez's 876,402 votes.
The initial count Fridley's office released early on the morning of June 4 had Pérez leading Yee in Lake County, 26 percent – or 2,326 votes – to 18.6 percent, or 1,662 votes, indicating the possibility of a trend in Pérez's favor.
Bowen's press office told Lake County News that the Secretary of State's Web site reports are based on the most current information provided by the counties.
As of Friday, Fridley's office had not given the County Administrative Office a report for the Tuesday meeting, and Fridley did not respond to a message from Lake County News on the status of the count.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.