Field set for Sonoma County elected offices on June 5 ballot; James Gore, David Rabbitt unopposed

Both Sonoma County supervisors whose terms expire this year are unopposed in their bids for re-election, so the only contested county-level races on the June ballot will be among the candidates running for sheriff, clerk and district attorney.

No one filed to run against Supervisors James Gore or David Rabbitt by last Friday’s deadline, putting the incumbents on track for easy re-election in the June 5 primary. The deadline if incumbents didn’t seek re-election was Wednesday, and, as expected, three candidates filed by that date in both the sheriff’s race and the race for clerk-recorder-assessor-registrar of voters.

Like Rabbitt and Gore, District Attorney Jill Ravitch once appeared headed toward re-election unopposed, but she received a surprise challenge from longtime criminal defense attorney Scott Murray.

Candidates will advance to a November election runoff if no one receives more than 50 percent of the vote in June. Without any challengers, however, Gore is set for re-election in three months to his second term representing the county’s northern 4th District and Rabbitt is heading toward re-election to his third term representing the county’s southern 2nd District.

“I take nothing for granted, and I thought for sure I’d have an opponent,” Rabbitt said. “I was preparing for that. But since it didn’t happen, I got to say, it’s a relief. And it just means I can continue to work on all things county and not be distracted by a campaign.”

Rabbitt said he still planned to hold some community town halls in advance of the June vote.

Also unopposed on the June ballot is Steve Herrington, who is running for a third term as Sonoma County superintendent of schools. And Erick Roeser, who county supervisors named auditor-?controller-treasurer-tax collector last year following the retirement of his predecessor, is running unchallenged in his first appearance on the ballot.

In the sheriff’s race, Capt. Mark Essick, retired Santa Rosa police lieutenant and current Santa Rosa Councilman Ernesto Olivares, and retired Los Angeles Police Capt. John Mutz are competing for voters’ approval to lead the county law enforcement agency. The incumbent, Rob Giordano, did not file for reelection.

The clerk-recorder-?assessor-registrar of voters’ race, meanwhile, has a field of three candidates from within the department: Deva Marie Proto, the chief deputy clerk-recorder; Ray Leonard, the department’s administrative services officer; and Rod Marusic, an assessment process specialist. The incumbent, William Rousseau, is not running for reelection.

County voters will consider four local measures: three school bonds and one appropriations limit renewal for a special ambulance service district on the Sonoma Coast.

And voters in all nine Bay Area counties also will consider Regional Measure 3, which would allow bridge tolls to rise by $3 - except on the Golden Gate Bridge - over the next few years to fund an expected ?$4.45 billion in transportation projects. The measure’s expenditure plan includes $120 million to widen Highway 101 in the Narrows between Petaluma and Novato, $40 million for SMART’s planned extension to Healdsburg and ?$100 million for improvements to Highway 37.

As of Thursday afternoon, Sonoma County had 260,080 registered voters, according to Deena Thompson-Stalder, the county’s chief deputy registrar of voters. That’s down about 5 percent from the 273,701 voters who were registered on Election Day in November 2016. Thompson-Stalder said it’s normal for registration to fall after presidential election years, and she expects an increase for the 2020 campaigns.

Of the county’s current registered voters, the vast majority - 72.5 percent - are registered to vote by mail. Thompson-Stalder urged those voters to act quickly once they receive their ballots.

“The more people can send us (early ballots), the more relevant and meaningful that election night number will be, because we’ll have more ballots counted,” she said. “We like to get them done as soon as possible.”

The county plans to begin sending mail-in ballots May 7. Residents are advised to allow up to two weeks for their ballot to arrive before contacting the registrar’s office.

County election officials are still looking for poll workers to serve on Election Day in June, Thompson-Stalder said. Interested members of the public can contact the county’s poll worker coordinator at 707-565-6816.

You can reach Staff Writer J.D. Morris at ?707-521-5337 or jd.morris@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @thejdmorris.