LAKEPORT, Calif. – On its busiest night of the year, the Lake County Registrar of Voters Office had a frustrating encounter with Murphy's Law.
Just a few hours past the 8 p.m. closing of the county's 53 precincts Tuesday night, two of the county's three voting machines jammed. Cleaning them didn't work, Registrar of Voters Diane Fridley reported on KPFZ Tuesday night.
Fridley said she said she and her staff were able to rely on a third machine from the department's store room in order to continue the count, which she said was going at about half speed.
In case it didn't work, she was prepared to borrow a machine from Sonoma County.
However, just after 1 a.m. Fridley's office released the preliminary results, with absentees and provisional ballots turned in on Tuesday yet to be counted during the 28-day election certification period.
The results tallied Tuesday night showed that, at least on the local level, voters chose challengers over incumbents, while Congressman Mike Thompson and state Assemblyman Wes Chesbro were returned to office, and Assembly member Noreen Evans won the state Senate seat currently held by Patricia Wiggins, who is retiring.
In the sheriff's race, Francisco Rivero received 8,102 votes or 53.9 percent of the vote, defeating 16-year incumbent Rod Mitchell, who had 6,919 votes, accounting for 46.1 percent of votes cast.
Don Anderson is projected to be the new district attorney, taking 7,597 votes or 53.3 percent of the vote compared to his opponent Doug Rhoades, who received 6,663 votes, or 46.7 percent.
Lake County News was unable to reach Rivero by phone early Wednesday morning, but spoke with Mitchell at close to 1 a.m.
Mitchell said it was just after midnight, when 50 percent of the results had been tallied, that he sought out Rivero at the Lake County Courthouse.
At that point he informed Rivero that he could begin the transition for his new administration as sheriff after Thanksgiving.
Mitchell, noting that he loves Lake County, said, “I owe it to the citizens to make sure that I facilitate as smooth a transition as possible.”
He said he hasn't thought about what he will do next, once his term runs out at the end of the year.
“There's too much to do right now in terms of getting ready for a new administration,” he said.
Because of the lateness of results being finalized, Lake County News will follow up with the rest of the candidates in the lead races later Wednesday.
Overall, voter turnout reported thus far was at 48.8 percent, with precinct ballots cast totaling 8,132, or 25 percent, compared to 7,749 absentees ballots, or 23.8 percent of the vote, according to the voting data released by Fridley's office.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow Lake County News on Twitter at http://twitter.com/LakeCoNews , on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Lake-County-News/143156775604?ref=mf and on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/user/LakeCoNews .
