Fournier pulls ahead of Eason in latest tally for County Board’s District 4 seat

Tenino Mayor Wayne Fournier pulled ahead of his District 4 opponent Vivian Eason in the latest tallies of votes for Thurston County Board of Commissioners Thursday afternoon.

Eason had led the race in the first two tallies of votes. The Thurston County Auditor reported Thursday that there were about 11,000 votes still to be counted in the general election.

Thursday’s tallies gave Fournier, a Democrat, 29,759 votes, or 50.5%, to 29,006, or 49.2%, for Eason, an independent. Eason had run before unsuccessfully for County Board against incumbent Tye Menser.

In the District 5 race, Emily Clouse maintained a comfortable lead over Terry S. Ballard, with 60.4% of the votes counted.

Both District 4 and 5 seats are open seats that were created last year when the Thurston County Board voted to expand from three members to five members when the county’s population hit 300,000.