Roberts, Simmons earn D-1, D-2 posts; Dec. 2 runoff will determine D-3, D-4
Last week’s Municipal Election determined only two of the four seats available on the Waycross City Commission.
The others will be decided in runoffs Tuesday, December 2.
Shawn Sanders and Katrena Felder will vie for the District 3 seat Felder now holds while William Tompkins and Tim Peacock face off for the District 4 post. The runoffs were needed after none of the candidates received more than 50 percent of the vote in the respective races.
Sanders totaled 123 votes (46.42 percent) to 85 for Felder and 54 for King Goree. Tompkins led in the race for the other district post with 155 votes (45.06 percent) to 132 for Peacock. Linda Slaughter-Titus was third with 55.
Felder survived a runoff when she won the District 3 seat in 2021. Tompkins and Peacock are seeking to fill the seat formerly held by Diane Hopkins, who died January 29 of this year, in the second year of her term.
Incumbent Shawn Roberts defeated challenger Willie Oliver for the District 1 post while former commissioner William Simmons returns to the panel from District 2 after topping Ayana Moore and Barry Worley.
Roberts
Simmons
Roberts collected 250 votes to 92 for Oliver. Simmons had 179 votes to 36 for Moore and nine for Worley.
Early voting for the eliminations will be 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday, November 24 through Wednesday, November 26 at the Ware County Board of Elections and Registration office, 408 Tebeau Street. Voting the day of the runoffs will be from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. at C.C. McCray City Auditorium for District 3 and Memorial Stadium for District 4.
Voters didn’t have to cast a ballot in the November 4 election to participate in the runoff. Absentee ballots for the runoff must be requested by Friday, November 21.
In the other local issue on the ballot, Ware Countians rejected the Floating Local Option Sales Tax referendum, 2,057-1,742. The FLOST would’ve added a one-cent sales tax for not more than five years for property tax relief for city and county residents.
In the ballot’s state races, Republican incumbents Tim Nichols in District 2 and Fitz Johnson in District 3 were the county’s winners for seats on the Georgia Public Service Commission, but their opponents — Alicia Johnson (D-2) and Peter Hubbard (D-3) — emerged as the winners in the statewide vote.
A total of 3,853 ballots were cast for the General Election. That represented 18.94 percent of the county's 20,342 registered voters.
Of the final vote total, 2,155 were cast on Tuesday with 1,632 in-person in advance and 55 by absentee. The board office mailed out 76 absentee ballots.
Friday, October 31 was the final day of the early period and it drew the highest number of ballots cast with 286 in-person and two absentee. Next highest day was October 30 with 167 and four.
