Incumbents score victories; voter turnout stays low

Several incumbents claimed easy victories over their challengers in Alachua County’s primary election on Tuesday.

With all 69 precincts reporting, Property Appraiser Ed Crapo, Sheriff Sadie Darnell and School Board member Eileen Roy all defeated their challengers by wide margins, and incumbent County Commissioner Mike Byerly claimed a decisive victory over former City Commissioner Rick Bryant in that raceprimary. Byerly will face Republican Kevin Riordan in the general election on’s Democratic Nov. 4.

Meanwhile, former School Board Chairwoman Barbara Sharpe unseated incumbent School Board member Janie S. Williams.

More than 24 percent of the county’s more than 135,700 registered voters showed up at the polls to decide those races and several others on the ballot on Tuesday. Alachua County Supervisor of Elections Pam Carpenter had estimated that more like 40 to 45 percent would turn out, based on a high level of interest in local races.

Among those races: the one for property appraiser, in which Crapo, a 28-year veteran of the office, defeated challenger Alonzo Perkins by a wide margin Tuesday night.

With all 69 precincts reporting, Crapo had garnered slightly over 65 percent of the votes.

“I think I’ve done an excellent job, and 65 percent of the vote is about what you’d expect if you’ve done your job right,” Crapo said Tuesday night.

Carpenter also said she had anticipated the sheriff’s race to attract voters to the polls.

Sadie Darnell led throughout the evening against Lonnie Scott in her bid to remain Alachua County sheriff.

“I feel pretty comfortable with a win,” Darnell said late Tuesday.

Darnell had 60 percent of the vote with all precincts reporting as well as absentee and early voting results, according to the Alachua County Supervisor of Elections Office.

Carpenter said activity at the polls was “a little light” all day. In addition, Tropical Storm Fay forced county officials to cancel one day of early voting.

“It’s looking a little quieter than we wish,” Carpenter said on Tuesday afternoon. “But then, anything less than 100 percent is quieter than we wish.”

“The only things I’d guess as being factors were people being distracted with the storm, and with the university starting up again on Monday,” Carpenter said. “There were a lot of things going on in the county this week, and that may have diverted people’s attention.”

Carpenter said voting mostly went smoothly, with a few glitches throughout the day.

Tuesday afternoon, a power outage affecting 1,200 Clay Electric customers in LaCrosse left that precinct in the dark and without air conditioning.

Voting continued, Carpenter said, but poll workers endured about an hour without air conditioning before power was restored to the LaCrosse precinct.

“We sent a generator up there, but by the time it got there, the electricity was back,” Carpenter said. “It’s just something to keep things interesting.”

In addition, after the polls closed Tuesday night, voters watching results come in via the Alachua County Supervisor of Elections Office saw results freeze at 53 of 69 precincts thanks to a computer server being down, Carpenter said.

Carpenter said she would be meeting with county IT staff this week to discuss how to prevent the problem in the future.

“We’ll review the process and make whatever upgrades we need to make so we’re ready to go before the presidential election in November,” Carpenter said.

Amy Reinink can be reached at (352) 374-5088 or reinina@gvillesun.com.