Only one election in Otsego County remained undecided Wednesday, although the results will not be official until Tuesday.
In the race for Roseboom town supervisor, Republican challenger Greta Peterson held a nine-vote lead against incumbent Republican Michael Stannard on Wednesday.
The running total stood at 85 votes for Peterson and 76 votes for Stannard.
However, several write-in votes have not been counted, and Stannard still has a chance to win, according to Cindy Jarvis, the county's Democratic deputy elections commissioner.
``The commissioners are going to meet, and they'll have to decide which of the remaining write-in votes to count,'' she said.
Stannard, a longtime incumbent, was beaten by Peterson in the Republican primary by nine votes, 43 to 34.
Stannard decided to run in the general election as a write-in candidate and has made the race close.
The outstanding write-in ballots have not been counted yet because the commissioners will have to determine whether the ballots comply with elections law.
``There are votes for him for the wrong office, and there are votes that use initials, so each one will have to be looked at carefully,'' Jarvis said.
Republican Elections Commissioner Sheila Ross said she and her Democratic counterpart, Hank Nicols, will review the ballots before all results are certified Tuesday.
Ross noted Roseboom used the county's new optical scanner voting machines this month, equipment that makes it easy to pencil in a name.
``It's much easier to cast a write-in with the scanners and paper ballots than it was on the lever machines,'' she said. ``I think we may have a lot more write-ins in the future."
In another close race, for Hartwick for town council, Democrat Julianne Sharratt has beaten Republican Anita Briggs Jones by one vote, 301 to 300, according to Lori Lehenbaurer, the county's Republican deputy elections commissioner.
The count had stood at 300 votes each, but the tie was broken when an absentee ballot was counted Tuesday.
In that election, voters were asked to select two candidates. Incumbent councilman Fred Field garnered 342 votes, and Sharratt has apparently secured the second seat.
Jarvis said that turnout in this year's election ``was pretty good for an off-year election.'' About 41.5 percent of the county's 33,514 voters, or 13,897 voters, cast ballots this month, she said.
``That's not as good as last year, when we had about
52 percent, but it's good for a non-presidential election year,'' she said. ``I think there was a lot of interest because we had two good treasurer candidates, quite a few contested races for county board and lots of races in the towns. People vote when they think their votes matter."
In the treasurer's race, Democrat Daniel Crowell has apparently defeated Republican Edward Keator Jr. by 153 votes, 6,302 to 6,149.
Crowell is now in line to succeed incumbent Republican Myrna Thayne, whom Keator beat in the Republican primary.
