13,000 ballots yet to be counted in Mendocino County

More than 13,000 ballots - over half of the total cast - remain to be counted in Mendocino County, potentially altering the November election results reported early Wednesday in some of the closer races.

In Fort Bragg, incumbent Mayor Dave Turner appeared in preliminary results to have lost his seat by just 32 votes. In Ukiah, Mayor Phil Baldwin lost by 89 votes in preliminary results.

Of the outstanding ballots, 13,072 were mail-in ballots and 452 were provisional ballots, typically issued at polling places. Of those, 2,139 are from Ukiah and 1,259 are from Fort Bragg, according to Mendocino County Assistant Registrar of Voters Katrina Bartolomie.

Another 2,736 are in the county’s 3rd supervisorial district, where there was a 247-vote span between the apparent winner, Tom Woodhouse, and Willits Councilwoman Holly Madrigal.

Tardy mail-in voters apparently account for most of the delay in counting ballots. Mail-in voters comprise about three-fourths of the county’s registered voters.

The elections office reported 9,044 mail-in ballots arrived at the office Tuesday. Of those, 320 were dropped at the elections office and 5,463 were dropped off at polling places, Bartolomie said. The others arrived at the office by mail.

Lake County had similar issues on a smaller scale. There are 5,536 ballots - about 44 percent of all ballots cast - left to be counted at its elections office, officials said.

The elections offices have 28 days to complete the count.

You can reach Staff Writer Glenda Anderson at 462-6473 or glenda.anderson@pressdemocrat.com. ?On Twitter @MendoReporter.