With just one vote more than his nearest competitor, Doug Clements secured a narrow win in the Charleston mayoral race Tuesday night, Nov. 25.
The runner-up in the race, Jan Wilson, requested a recount last week, and the ballots were tallied again Tuesday. Outgoing Mayor Brenda Christensen announced the finalized results at the canvass that evening.
“The totals are: Jan Wilson, 92; Shawn Taylor, 72; write-in Doug Clements, 93,” she said.
Wasatch County clerk-auditor Joey Granger said the recount confirmed the numbers her office published last week.
“In the spirit of making sure everyone felt comfortable, we did go ahead and pull ballots out as we ran them through the machine,” she said. “We pulled ballots out and counted everything by hand as well.”
All the counts yielded identical results.
Granger said her office also reached out to voters to confirm their signatures, so there’s no question of the validity of the results.
Charleston saw very high voter turnout: 259 of its 327 registered voters, or over 79%, cast ballots this November.
In addition to a new mayor, the small town near Deer Creek Reservoir also elected two councilmembers, Michael Bauer and incumbent Scott Solum.
Charleston is not the only Wasatch Back town to have gone through the recount process this election cycle. In Park City, Ryan Dickey was confirmed Monday as the next mayor, following a recount. Just seven votes separated that race.
