Thurston general election turnout reaches 35% with 5,000 votes left to count
About 35.2% of Thurston County voters cast their ballots in the 2021 general election, according to in-progress data from the county Auditor’s Office.
Auditor Mary Hall told The Olympian turnout fell within the 30-40% range as she expected, but she wishes more people voted this year, as they do in even-year elections when state and federal races are on the ballot.
“I always wish for higher turnout,” Hall said. “I think we just need to educate people about the role of municipal government, school boards and fire commissioners. Those are pretty important positions, but these tend to always be low-turnout elections.”
About 5,000 votes from across the county still need to be counted, Hall said late Friday. This does not include any cured ballots that may come in response to challenged ballots, she added.
The election process
Hall commended her staff for once again processing ballots smoothly.
“I’ve got a really great team,” Hall said. “It’s nothing out of the ordinary, you know. It’s a pretty predictable process.”
More people from across the political spectrum came in to observe the election and ballot-counting process this year compared to previous years, Hall said.
“In previous years, we might be lucky to get one or two,” Hall said. “We had 40 people at our logic and accuracy test. That’s when we test the programming of our tabulators. So, it’s been terrific.”
To encourage observers, she said her office included a full-page advertisement in the primary voters’ pamphlet and a half page advertisement in the general election voters’ pamphlet.
Election results
Most races did not appear close after Friday’s tallies were completed, Hall said. So far, 68,917 ballots from throughout the county have been counted.
The one close race is for Bucoda Town Council Position No. 3. In that race, Kaitlyn Nagy Koeller and Kevin Jones were tied with 35 votes each as of Friday.
In Olympia, Clark Gilman, Lisa Parshley and Dontae Payne were all still leading their races by thousands of votes as of Friday.
Meanwhile, Yến Huỳnh, who was appointed in January to finish state Rep. Jessica Bateman’s vacated term, led attorney Robbi Kesler with 57.6% of the vote.
The closest Olympia race has incumbent Jim Cooper ahead of challenger Spence Weigand with 54.5% of the vote. The margin of victory has grown to more than 1,300 voters from just less than 400 votes in Tuesday night’s initial tally.
Lacey City Council incumbent Carolyn Cox, with 54.2% of the votes, and current Lacey Planning Commissioner Robin Vazquez, with more than 61% of the votes, still led their races as of Friday. Vazquez is poised to win the seat being vacated by Cynthia Pratt.
In Tumwater, the frontrunners were Debbie Sullivan in the mayoral race and Peter Agabi for the one contested city council race.
Bob Iyall is holding onto his lead in the race for Port Commissioner District No. 2. He held 51.7% of the vote compared to Jessie Simmons’ 47.7% on Friday. The margin is about 2,500 votes.
In the race for Port Commissioner District No. 3, commercial real estate broker Amy Evans leads Joel Hansen, a developer of solar systems, with 55.5% of the vote compared to Hansen’s 43.8%.
Results for other Nov. 2 general election in Thurston County, including city council races, school board races and ballot propositions can be found on The Olympian website.
