Election results remain the same: Ogorchock, Tiscareno win Antioch Council race, Measure O passes, Belle wins County School Board seat

23,000 ballots still left to be counted, final count to be done before Thanksgiving

By Allen Payton

As of the update of the vote count at 5:00 p.m. on Friday, November 7, 2014, the County Elections website showed the results of Tuesday night’s election were confirmed in the Antioch City Council, Measure O and County School Board races.

Lori Ogorchock expanded her lead over appointed Councilman Tony Tiscareno for a total of 5,946 votes or 23.48% to 5,619 or 22.19%, who expanded his lead over third-place finisher, Antioch School Board Trustee Diane Gibson-Gray who had 5,1522 votes or 20.34% of the vote.

I’m excited. I’m thrilled. I’m ready to roll up my sleeves and get to work,” Ogorchock said after hearing the news of the results. “I want to thank everyone who voted for me. I have listened to what you’ve said. And I want those on my committee, Mary and Bill Chapman, Gary and Brenda Gorbal, Bob Lyles and last but not least, Kristen Vistali. Special thanks to my family for their support, and especially my husband and stood by me.”

Tiscareno, who was in the middle of celebrating at a restaurant when reached for comment, said his election was a confirmation of his appointment by the city council in 2012.

It validates their belief in me and the people spoke,” he said. “I feel good about it. I’m honored to be elected, instead of appointed. It was a hard fought battle, but a clean campaign as far as candidates were concerned. I want to thank all of the candidates and congratulate Lori and thank Diane especially for running a nice race, as well, because we were neck and neck.

I look forward to serving our community,” he added.

At a ribbon cutting for the new 420 Bar & Grill in downtown Antioch, on Thursday evening, Gibson-Gray said she was resolved to remaining on the school board and thought it was probably a good thing, with the recent loss of two other incumbents, Joy Motts and Gary Hack in Tuesday’s election.

Measure O passed and the yes votes increased over the no votes, by 7,867 to 7,436 votes, more than the 180 votes difference at the end of the counting on Tuesday night.

Reached for comment, Yes on Measure O committee Chairman Don Freitas said about winning by 431 votes, with a laugh, “In this case that is a huge, huge victory.”

It feels great that the good guys finally won. I’m just happy for Antioch,” Freitas added. “By conventional political wisdom we should have lost miserably when a $200,000 campaign of lies, half-truths and distortions, was spent against you.”

The people saw through all the out-of-town special interest money and voted for Antioch,” he stated. “This started as a citizens initiative and ended as one. It was a David vs. Goliath fight. It wasn’t right that most businesses in Antioch paid a business license fee and residential rental property owners didn’t. It feels great to be on the right side and have the community support us.”

After two years of meetings between the Friday Morning Breakfast Club and representatives of the California Apartment Association and the Delta Association of Realtors, they never, ever offered an alternative,” Freitas said. “All they said was ‘no’.”

It was a long, long tortuous journey,” he said with a sigh of relief.

In the contentious Area 5 County School Board race, Jeff Belle’s lead over Cynthia Ruehlig decreased, but he held on to win by 336 votes, with 12,991 votes or 50.27% versus 12,655 votes or 48.97% of the vote.

Also, in the Area 4 County School Board race, in which Antioch resident Richard Asadoorian was seeking reelection, Mike Maxwell increased his lead to 2,253 votes to win the seat.

There were a total of 236,727 ballots cast that have been counted, out of 527,521 registered voters in the county, for a 44.88% voter turnout, Tuesday night.

However, there are still votes left to be counted, according to County Clerk-Recorder Joe Canciamilla.

There are 13,000 provisional ballots and 10,000 exceptions, which are ballots that are damaged and the machine can’t count them, or they’re somehow spoiled otherwise, that all have to be hand-processed,” he said. “But, I don’t expect anything to change in those races. They’ll be divided up pretty much the same.”

Not every ballot that we have will apply to every race. Because a lot of the ballots, we pulled both pages, even though only one page had a question,” Canciamilla added. “Not every provisional ballot will be counted, because people voted where they aren’t registered or they voted by mail and forgot and voted at the polls.”

We will issue a report a week from the day, and another one the following Friday,” he said. “We have until December 2nd  to certify the results, but we’ll certify before Thanksgiving.”

For complete results visit www.cocovote.us.

LATEST RESULTS

Antioch City Council Election

LORI OGORCHOCK 5,946 23.48%

TONY G TISCARENO ( I ) 5,619 22.19%

DIANE GIBSON-GRAY 5,152 20.34%

LAMAR THORPE 4,398 17.37%

ANTHONY SEGOVIA 1,866 7.37%

KARL DIETZEL 825 3.26%

JEFFREY HALL-COTTRELL 752 2.97%

STEVEN BADO 625 2.47%

WRITE-IN 142 0.56%

 

Measure O

Yes 7,867 51.41%

No 7,436 48.59%

Total 15,303

County School Board – Area 5

CYNTHIA TEVES RUEHLIG 12,655 48.97%

JEFF BELLE 12,991 50.27%

WRITE-IN 194 0.75%

Total 25,840

County School Board – Area 4

RICHARD ASADOORIAN ( I ) 19,494 47.04%

MIKE MAXWELL 21,747 52.47%

WRITE-IN 203 0.49%

Total 41,444


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