Giselle Hale, Diane Howard and Rick Hunter remained the top vote-getters for the three open seats on Redwood City Council following the latest release of election results on Tuesday, with all three widening their leads in the race since results were last unveiled on Friday.
But one full week after Election Day, many more votes remain to be counted in this all-mail voting pilot in San Mateo County.
As of today’s release of results, a total of 144,100 votes had been counted out of 271,704 that were cast in San Mateo County, according to figures posted by county Elections officials reporting on the total number of ballots received as of the Friday deadline. That means roughly 47 percent of the votes cast countywide have yet to be tallied.
The significant number of yet-uncounted ballots has left several races still undecided.
That includes the race for three seats on the Redwood City Council, where Hale, Howard and Hunter find themselves in a stronger position in the latest count. Hale is the top vote-getter at 5,937 votes, 165 votes ahead of Howard, who is 486 votes ahead of Hunter. But the number of votes separating Hunter and the fourth-place candidate, Diana Reddy, is only 134 votes.
On social media, the Hunter campaign took note of how close the election is and advised supporters to stay tuned for the next release of results, scheduled for the end of the week.
Fifth place finisher Christina Umhofer, 705 votes out of third place, also offered similar advice to her supporters on social media.
Sixth- and seventh-place finishers, Jason Galisatus and Ernie Schmidt, respectively, issued statements last week acknowledging that they were going to fall short of winning one of the three seats.
What hasn’t gained much ground in the latest results is Measure W, the half-cent sales tax increase to fund transit and transportation projects. The measure inched up slightly from 65.6 precent to 65.83 percent since the last release of voting tallies. The measure requires two-thirds approval to pass.
The release date for the next round of results will take place Friday, Nov. 16. To view the county’s Nov. 6 election results, click here.
