The books officially closed on another election year in Richmond County Tuesday morning with no challenges or protests of previously reported results.

The Richmond County Board of Elections certified the results of last week’s municipal elections, finding no change in those who were elected and only a handful of ballots which were rejected from the general election.

“We’re really pleased with how well things went with this year’s municipal elections,” County Board of Elections Director Connie Kelly said. “There were no issues witah the voting equipment, no challenges or protests to the results and the poll workers did an outstanding job on election day.”

Voter turnout was just over a quarter of those eligible to vote. Of the county’s 12,388 registered voters, 3,122 of them either cast a ballot on election day or mailed one in, voted during the early voting period or cast a provisional ballot.

There were six provisional ballots rejected out of the election, of the 41 attempted provisional votes. Three regular votes were thrown out of the Rockingham mayoral race because of over-voting, Kelly explained.

“Before we certify the results, the State Board does a random selection of precincts and contests that we have to do a hand to eye count on,” she said.

The process is called a sample audit, and this year the Richmond County Board of Elections was asked to do a sample audit of the Rockingham Mayor race, the Mark’s Creek One Precinct and the Hamlet mayoral race.

There were no changes on either the Mark’s Creek or Hamlet mayor count, but three votes for Bruce Stanback were cast out in the Rockingham contest because the name of the candidate was marked and written-in on the same ballot.

“The computer doesn’t see that as an over-vote, but when we do a sample audit we can’t count those as votes,” Kelly explained.

The three fewer votes brought Stanback’s total down to 364, or 20 percent of the vote for Rockingham Mayor.

The winner of the contest, Gene McLaurin, had neither gained or lost any votes in the sample audit, and his total number was 1,408, or 79 percent of the vote.

The final tally of the Hamlet mayoral race had winner Jeff Smart pulling 55 percent of the vote at 616, while challenger Jesse McQueen pulled 44 percent of the vote at 488 and less than 1 percent of the ballots had a write-in vote.

In the uncontested Ellerbe race, Olivia Webb won the election with 75 percent of the vote at 91, while 25 percent of the voters opted for a write-in candidate.

“Of those 31 write-in votes, 24 of them were for (incumbent Ellerbe Mayor) Lynne McCaskill,” Kelly explained.

Finally, the uncontested Hoffman mayoral race saw incumbent Mayor Jo Ann Jasper-Thomas pull 100 percent of the vote at 44. There were also six votes cast out for under-voting in that election.

While there was no change in the three candidates elected to the Rockingham City Council, there was a different top vote-getter in the official than the unofficial results.

Newcomer to City Council Travis Billingsley edged past incumbent Councilman Steve Morris by two votes after the provisional ballots were counted, as both won four-year terms to the municipal panel.

Billingsley had nearly 20 percent of the vote at 916, while Morris pulled 914 and incumbent Councilman John Hutchinson will face another reelection bid in two years after getting 881 votes.

Incumbent Councilwoman Shirley Fuller lost her bid for reelection with 804 votes, while first-time public office seekers Teressa Beavers and Jerry Austin Jr. got 740 votes and 474 votes, respectively.

Both Hamlet City Councilwomen earned four-year terms, with newcomer Dr. Diane Honeycutt earning about 38 percent of the vote with 729, and incumbent Abbie Covington getting 35 percent at 681 votes.

First-time challenger Johnathan Buie’s 27 percent wasn’t enough to get him on the council. His final count was 514.

There were no changes in the Ellerbe or Hoffman town council races following Tuesday’s certification of 2009 election results.

n Staff Writer Philip D. Brown can be reached at (910) 997-3111 ext. 32, or by e-mail at pbrown@yourdailyjournal.com.