Friday 11/14/14 4:25 p.m. Update…
JOHN McCANN 18,370 50.06%
STEVE PADILLA 18,324 49.94%
Only 29 votes were added to the count in Chula Vista today. John McCann earned 13 of them, Steve Padilla got 16.
McCann still leads by 46 votes.
The reports from Derrick Roach and others observing the process are that the bulk of the additional ballots were those cast by touch screen voting machines, with no other ballots left to count in Chula Vista. There are, however, about 7,500 ballots left throughout the county.
As close as it ended up, this race appears to be over. Short of, as Roach commented below, “A box of ballots showing up in someone’s car trunk.”
A big congratulations, it appears, is in order for John McCann!
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Thursday 11/13/14 4 p.m. Update…
JOHN McCANN 18,357 50.07%
STEVE PADILLA 18,308 49.93%
With additional votes counted, John McCann still leads Steve Padilla, but now by only 49 votes.
What may be good news for McCann, only 63 more votes were counted in Chula Vista, which may indicate the counting in that city has neared its end.
McCann received 23 of those ballots, while Padilla added 40 to his total.
The Registrar estimates 10,000 remaining ballots from throughout the region. Those close to the situation say the focus has been on completing the count in Chula Vista, which may also account for only 63 votes being added to the totals today — if those were straggling provisional ballots from yesterday.
We’ll see. We always do, eventually.
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Initial post from Thursday morning…
While some have been gushing over the close Mayor’s race in Imperial Beach, gone largely unnoticed is Democrat Steve Padilla, the former Chula Vista Mayor, creeping up on Republican former Councilmember John McCann in recent vote updates in the Chula Vista City Council election.
At the end of the day on Monday, McCann led Padilla with 50.58 percent of the vote. By Tuesday, McCann’s percentage had dropped to 50.19 percent, which left him with a 136 vote lead (18,102 to 17,966 votes).
Yesterday, 534 votes were added, with Padilla getting 302 of those (over 56 percent). That leaves McCann with a 66 vote lead, .18 percent of the vote.
The question is how many votes are left to count in Chula Vista, out of 14,000 throughout San Diego County.
Some close to the process say Registrar of Voters staff went through most of the remaining Chula Vista ballots on Tuesday, while not anticipating there were more than a handful to count yesterday. But, over 500 ballots ended up being counted, definitely more than a handful.
Padilla is clearly hoping there really are more than a handful at this point, while McCann feels the breath on his neck.