Charles City re-elects Andrews mayor, 2 new members for school board

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com

The difference between an apparent winner and the next two candidates in the Charles City Board of Education election Tuesday was less than half a percentage point, as the only incumbent running appears to have been narrowly re-elected, along with two newcomers.

With three seats available, the three candidates with the highest vote totals will take office, and Dr. David Schrodt and Katheryn Fox were clear winners for two of those three seats, with Schrodt coming in first place and Fox in second. Both will be new to the board.

Third place apparently went to incumbent Josh Mack, the current school board president, with 853 votes, or 16.73% of the vote.

The third, fourth and fifth place vote-getters all captured 16-point-something percent of the vote, with Mack’s apparent third-place tally coming in just 10 votes ahead of the next highest total.

The Charles City School District is mostly in Floyd County, but also extends into Chickasaw County, and 48 votes were cast by Chickasaw County residents of the district.

An already close race was made even closer with the addition of the Chickasaw County votes, as Mack received none of those votes but Claire Jung, in fourth place, added 13 votes to her total.

All the results, as reported by the Floyd County Auditor’s office and Chickasaw County Auditor’s Office Tuesday evening, are unofficial until the votes are canvassed by each county’s Board of Supervisors.

In the Charles City mayoral and City Council election, 36% of the registered voters in the city turned out, picking Dean Andrews for his second term as mayor by a 2-to-1 margin over challenger Richard Severin, 784 votes to 372.

There were 1,872 votes cast in Charles City, out of 5,202 registered voters, but across the county the turnout was lower, with a countywide total of 2,424 votes cast out of 11,136 registered voters for a total turnout of 21.8%.

There were only two candidates for the two available Charles City Council seats, and incumbent DeLaine Freeseman and newcomer Patrick Lumley each tallied more than 900 votes in their wins.