Election Update: Borough Assembly Races Are Tight; Borough Error Makes District 2 Margin Thinner

Absentee ballots are currently being counted for the Mat-Su Borough election, and the two Borough Assembly races are close, and the District 2 race, between Noel Woods and Matthew Beck is much tighter than was originally reported by the Borough.

Originally, the Borough website indicated that challenger Matthew Beck led incumbent Noel Woods by 123 votes.  On Thursday morning, however, the results showed Beck with 100 fewer votes, meaning his lead was cut to 23.  Beck says that there was a clerical error at the Borough that resulted in the incorrect vote total.  He says his hopes are still up that the slim margin will hold, and that the Borough should be done counting by the end of next week.   Borough Clerk Lonnie McKechnie confirmed the error.  She says that when results were being reported from precincts, that a staff member erroneously entered ‘114’ instead of ’14’ votes for Beck from one polling location.

In the District 1 election, Jim Sykes leads Doug Glenn by a margin of 45 votes.  Sykes is known by many in the Upper Valley, and still owns a cabin near Talkeetna.  He says that absentee ballot counting does not normally change the leader of a race, but that he won’t know for sure until the last ballot is counted.  He says he is proud to have run a positive campaign, and is waiting to see if he will be the person sworn-in to the Assembly seat currently held by Warren Keogh.

The election results will be submitted to the Borough Assembly on October 15th for certification.