Madison County primary election results

Ashley Hunter

Greene Publishing, Inc.

As the polls closed on Tuesday, Aug. 30 and the final ballots came in to the Madison County Supervisor of Elections office, many of the citizens of the county had weighed in with whom they wanted to continue to lead in the upcoming year.

But, for some local and governmental seats, the election is only beginning.

The role of County Commissioner for District 5 and Superintendent of Schools were two seats in particular that were voted on by residents on Aug. 30, but those seats will reappear on the Nov. 8 ballot.

In November, Marcus Hawkins, Sr. (Democrat), who won the August election, will reappear on the ballot alongside Gwendolyn Hubbard (NPA) and Karen Pickles (Republican).

For the Madison County Commissioner District 3, Commissioner Ronnie Moore (Democrat) kept his seat, with 367 votes divided between Precinct 2 (84 votes) and Precinct 5 (283 votes). Running against Moore was another Democratic candidate, Craig Anderson, who received 247 votes. As there were no other candidates for the District 3 Commission seat, the election is considered final.

County Commissioner District 5 was also up for election during this round of the polls, and current-commissioner Rick Davis kept a grasp on his seat with a 410 vote divided between Precinct 3 (210 votes) and Precinct 11 (200 votes). Davis' rival, Michael Havard received 273 votes. Havard will not be on the November ballot, but Davis will continue to have to defend his seat from candidates Nancy Moral (Republican) and Adrian “A.D.” Kinsey (NPA).

The County Commission District 1 seat did not go under the vote during the Aug. 30 election, due to only one of the candidates being a Democrat nominee. The seat will be voted on during the November election, with candidates Justin Hamrick (Democrat and current-commissioner), Alston Kelley (Republican) and Marvin “Merv” Mattair (NPA) running for the seat.

The title of Superintendent of Schools was up for election, and current Superintendent Doug Brown (Democrat) had not entered the race for reelection. Multiple candidates had placed their name into the election during campaign season, but eventually the Aug. 30 Democrat vote came down between Marcus Hawkins and Ben Killingsworth. It was a close race between the two candidates, but Hawkins won the election with a 247-vote lead on Killingsworth when Hawkins came out of the election with 1,636 votes.

Killingsworth scored 1,409 votes.

The seats for School Board Districts 2 and 4 were also up for reelection, with fierce competition reigning between the candidates.

For District 2, Kenneth Hall (NPA) was running against Carol Gibson (NPA). Hall had been a School Board member for 19 years, but his streak ended when Gibson took the seat after the end of the election showed she had 681 votes and Hall had received 378. As no other candidates are slated to run for the seat, the election is considered final.

In District 4, current-seat holder Karen Pickles had given up her seat in order to run for Superintendent of Schools on the November ballot, and the vote on Aug. 30 was between William “Billy” Tolar (NPA) and Reginald E. Daniels (NPA).

Tolar received 336 votes from the three precincts (4, 9, and 10) while Daniels came in just a step ahead, with 439 votes. The poll between Tolar and Daniels had no other candidates for the title, ending the election in Daniels' favor.

On the August ballot were also the primary votes for the Florida United States Senator for Republican, Democrat and Libertarian parties.

Each party had multiple candidates, but the three with the highest votes will be going forward onto the November ballot.

While Marco Rubio dropped out of the Presidential Primary earlier this year, Rubio held up strong in the poll booths for the Republican United States Senator nomination, scoring the lead vote for the Republican party in both Madison County and the state of Florida. In Madison County, Rubio received a landslide of the Republican vote, with 84.88 percent (1,005 votes) of the Republican voters supporting Rubio. In the state of Florida, Rubio received 72 percent of the Republican vote, which came to 1,028,283 votes.

For the Democrat poll, Patrick Murphy took support the Madison County voters, with 46.69 percent of the voters (1,311 votes) favoring Murphy over the other Democrat politicians. Murphy also led the Florida vote, with 59 percent of the voters casting their ballot for him, which amounted to 663,236 votes in total.

The Libertarian Party did not fare as well in the Madison County polls, with only three Libertarian voters coming out in support of their candidates. All three votes went to Paul Stanton, who is also leading the Libertarian party in the state of Florida with the support of 74 percent of the Libertarian voters. However, Stanton only received 2,943 votes throughout Florida in total, which doesn't bode well for Stanton in the November election.

Rubio, Murphy and Stanton will all be on the November ballot for their respective parties.

Democratic Congressional Representatives for Florida District 5 were also voted on during the Aug. 30 election, with Corrine Brown, LaShonda “L.J.” Holloway and Al Lawson all being divided amongst democratic voters.

Lawson completely overpowered Holloway and Brown in the Madison County polls, as he won 2,112 votes compared to Brown's 590 and Holloway's 253. The story is much the same when looking at the grand total of votes throughout the counties that make up Florida's District 5, as Lawson took 48 percent (39,261 votes), though Brown drew close to Lawson, as she gained 39 percent (32,157 votes) of the District 5 Democrat voters. Holloway struggled to keep up with only 13 percent at 11,004 votes.

Lawson will return to the November ballot against Republican candidate Glo Smith.

The rivalry between Paul S. Bryan (NPA) and T. Bradley McRae (NPA) has been steep, but during the election, the people of Madison County chose to reelect Bryan to the position of Circuit Judge for the 3rd Judicial Court (Group 1). Bryan just surpassed McRae with 59.01 percent of the voters (2,433 votes). McRae received 40.99 percent of the voters (1,690 votes) in comparison.

Also on the August ballot was the Solar Device Tax Exemption Amendment 4 item. The amendment would give a green light to clean energy by providing a property tax break for people who install solar panels on their home. The amendment also removes Florida's “tangible personal property tax,” which taxed solar equipment installations in homes. With the passing of the amendment, solar power systems will be a more profitable business for Florida.

It should be no surprise that the people of the Sunshine State, including those in Madison County, chose to approve the amendment, giving it 73 percent voter-support in the state of Florida, with 1,970,463 votes. In Madison County, Amendment 4 was supported with 61.16 percent voter approval (2,560 votes in favor). Only 38.84 percent of the voter population voted against the Constitutional Amendment (1,626 against).

Until Tuesday, Nov. 8, the polls are closed, and candidates will return to their campaign trails to prepare for the final, general election.

To read more about the Madison County election and poll results, see page seven in the Madison Enterprise-Recorder.

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