Austerman, Peterson Join Kodiak Assembly as Voters Approve Proposition One

Preliminary results from Tuesday’s election are in, with 2,204 people casting their votes at Kodiak’s nine precincts.

The ballot only featured one major contested race with three folks running for two Kodiak Island Borough Assembly seats. Frank Peterson Jr. garnered the most votes with 830; and he’ll join incumbent Carol Austerman who was re-elected with 727 votes. Dennis Symmons came up short with 629 votes, but he will join the Service Area No. 1 Board, which was an uncontested race. Natasha Hayden will take that board’s other seat.

The other contested race this year was for the Monashka Bay Road Service Area Board. Three candidates were vying for a pair of three-year seats. Tom Lance and Randy Spivey tied with 44 votes each to join that board. Darlene Turner received 14 votes.

Proposition One was approved by the voters with 848 people voting yes, 462 voting no. The proposition prevents those in public office from being employed by the borough, or entering into personal service contracts with the borough. Borough Clerk Nova Javier said she needs to work with the borough attorney to figure out how the proposition will be implemented.

Other than that, most races were determined before election day.

Jerrol Friend will take the office of Borough Mayor and Pat Branson was re-elected as City Mayor. Neither had any challengers for office.

It was the same in the Kodiak City Council election, with Charlie Davidson and John Whiddon running unopposed. They were re-elected with 377 and 343 votes respectively.

Javier said those elected to office will be sworn in during the next meetings for the respective governing bodies. She said they will then take office officially the Monday after that meeting.

Brianna Gibbs is a reporter at KMXT in Kodiak.

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