Wenatchee School Board Race Between Iniguez-Smith To Be Recounted

The Wenatchee School Board Position 2 race is headed to a recount after final results released Tuesday showed Incumbent Board President Maria Iniguez with a slim 14 vote win over Randy Smith.

The margin is well within the one-half of one percent difference that triggers a mandatory hand recount under state law.

Chelan County Auditor Skip Moore says his office is getting the process moving quickly.

"Right now, the plan is to prepare ballots on the 29th and recount on the 30th and 1^st,” Moore said

Moore says they'll have results of the recount on Friday, December 1st.

Tuesday's results showed Iniguez received 50.09% percent of the vote with 1,948 ballots cast in her favor while Smith received 1,934 votes, or 49.73% of the ballots.

The race was tight from the beginning, with Iniguez holding a 100-vote lead on election day, November 7. More results released on November 9th found her lead slipping to 40 votes, and then narrowing to 19 votes in another update on November 13th.

At that point, Moore correctly predicted Smith would not be able to overcome Iniguez' lead, slim as it was.

After the tally from the 13th, Moore said there were likely not enough ballots left in the race to change the outcome, even if they all went for Smith, which was also unlikely, based on previous results in the race.

The county canvassing board, which is composed of Moore, Chelan County Commissioner Tiffany Gering and Chelan County Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Susan Hinkle, was required to certify the final results Tuesday.

The canvassing board then was to direct the auditor’s office to recount the race. The board will recertify election results once the outcome of the recount is determined.

Moore is confident his office can complete the task in three days.

"We're prepared," Moore said. "We have enough staff to do it. We've added some extra staff as well that'll give us a hand. We should be able to get it done in three days.”

Moore's staff could also be hand recounting one other race in Chelan County. Len England received 1,763 votes (50.06%) in the Hospital District No, 2 Commissioner #1 race against Mary Signorelli, who received 1,739 votes (49.38%), a difference of 24 votes.

December 7th is the final day for the Washington Secretary of State to finalize results.