Absentee votes counted

finalists still the same

September 13, 2002|by LAURA ERNDE

laurae@herald-mail.com

Incumbent Paul Swartz moved up a spot to number one among the Democrats running for Washington County Commissioner after absentee ballots were counted Thursday.

Otherwise, the outcome of Tuesday's election was unchanged by absentees. The five top vote-getters in each party will advance to the Nov. 5 general election.

Swartz picked up 140 votes to jump ahead of former vote-leader Jim Brown in the balloting.

Swartz now has 3,727 votes to Brown's 3,710. Incumbent Bert Iseminger finished third with 3,649 votes, Herb Hardin came in fourth with 3,158 votes and Constance Cramer was fifth with 3,011 votes.

Among the Republican candidates for County Commissioner, the order of finish did not change with the absentee ballots.

Gregory I. Snook was first with 3,980 votes followed by fellow incumbent William J. Wivell with 3,707 votes. Jim Kercheval took third place with 3,124 votes, Doris I. Nipps was fourth with 2,795 votes and John C. Munson finished fifth with 2,681 votes.

Munson increased his slim lead over sixth-place finisher Steve Palmer, who had 2,526 votes.

Election officials counted 544 absentee ballots Thursday.

Election results won't become official until Sept. 18, after officials count the last 50 ballots, Election Director Dorothy Kaetzel said.

Those include 10 provisional ballots cast by people who registered to vote in other Maryland counties but moved here. The other 40 ballots are absentee ballots that were held back in order to protect the privacy of the provisional voters.

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