By Kirk Ross
Staff Writer
Shortly after 7:30 p.m. Tuesday night, the activity at the Orange County Board of Elections new offices on South Cameron Street in Hillsborough kicked into high gear as results started flowing in from the county’s 44 poling precincts.
Within an hour, the 2010 primary and Orange County School Board election was decided – almost.
On Wednesday, the campaign of Cal Cunningham hand delivered a formal request for a recount to state board of elections offices in Raleigh. Cunningham placed second in a six-way Democratic primary to select who will face first-term GOP incumbent Richard Burr in the fall. Burr handily won his party’s primary Tuesday night, gathering 80 percent of the votes in a field of four candidates.
Secretary of State Elaine Marshall was the top vote-getter among the Democrats, winning 36.36 percent of the vote statewide and carrying Orange County with 38.81 percent. Cunningham took 27.31 percent of the statewide vote and 32.24 percent of the Orange County total. Chapel Hill resident Ken Lewis took third place in the Senate primary, winning 17.04 percent statewide and 23.09 in Orange County.
Marshall did not win more than 40 percent of the total, which allowed Cunningham to call for a runoff. He indicated he would do so shortly after the results rolled in. In her acceptance speech, Marshall, whose campaign leadership includes Carrboro-based political consultant Thomas Mills, predicted she would best Cunningham by an even wider margin the second time around.
The runoff will be held on June 22. Early voting will be available at the board of elections office in Hillsborough only, starting June 3.
In the evening’s other congressional primary, Republican B.J. Lawson won the right to take on U.S. Fourth Congressional District incumbent David Price in a rematch of his unsuccessful bid in 2008 to unseat the Chapel Hill Democrat.
The only other close race of the evening in Orange County was in the Democratic primary for the District 2 representative on the Orange County Board of Commissioners, in which Earl McKee of Rougemont beat Renee Price of Hillsborough by 90 votes.
McKee received 2,726 votes (50.84 percent) to Price’s 2,636 (49.16 percent).
McKee will face Republican Greg Andrews of Efland in the fall.
Tracey Reams, director of the county board of elections, said the margin was tight but not close enough to trigger a recount. A look at provisional ballots, she said, did not seem to indicate that the race would tighten enough to get to under the 1 percent threshold required before a recount could be requested. Reams said that as of Wednesday afternoon, election workers had identified a possible 72 provisional ballots. Most of those ballots, she said, were from outside District 2.
Aside from the close commissioner and senate races, much of the direction of the vote was clear early into the returns.
Voters again chose Barry Jacobs in the Democratic primary for a seat on the Orange County board of commissioners. Jacobs, who has served on the board for three terms, received 6,125 votes, or 52.74 percent, ahead of former Hillsborough Mayor Joe Phelps, who received 3,689 votes, and Carrboro Board of Aldermen member Joal Hall Broun, who tallied 1,800 votes. No Republican filed to run for the seat.
Sheriff Lindy Pendergrass, the state’s longest serving sheriff with 28 years on the job, also handily won on Tuesday, receiving 8,016 votes and swamping the 3,710 total posted by former Hillsborough police Chief Clarence Birkhead.
In the only state legislative race in Orange County, GOP candidate Ryan Hilliard beat Jon Gregg Bass in the party’s state Senate District 23 primary. Hilliard took 1,690 votes (78.39 percent) of the total in the county and 2,240 votes (76.37 percent) in the district, which is comprised of Orange and Person counties. Hilliard faces state Sen. Ellie Kinnaird of Chapel Hill in the fall.
With four seats open on the seven-member Orange County Board of Education, two incumbents, Chair Anne Medenblik and Debbie Piscitelli, were returned to office. Newcomers Donna Dean Coffey and Brenda Stephens will be joining them on the board.
Piscitelli was the top vote-getter with 3,534 (16.8 percent) of the votes, with Coffey, who recently served as Orange County’s budget director, second with 3,211 votes (15.2 percent), followed by Stephens, who has previously served on the board, with 2,651 (12.6 percent) and Medenblik with 2,565 (12.2 percent). Laura Nicholson (2,500; 11.9), Will Atherton (2,423; 11.5), Keith Cook (2,248; 10.7) and Charles Williams (1,888; 8.9) failed to win election.
Also settled on Tuesday were the contests for two seats on the state court of appeals.
Judge Ann Marie Calabria was re-elected after beating out two challengers. Calabria won 265,769 votes (37 percent), Jane Gray received 260,2457 votes (36.23 percent) and Mark Klass received 192,304 votes (26.77 percent).
In the other race, Steven Walker took the top vote total with 265,381 votes (38.51 percent), defeating incumbent Rick Elmore, who drew 198,326 votes (28.78 percent). Also in the race, Leto Copely received 124,157 votes (18.02 percent) and Al Bain received 101,237 votes (14.69 percent).