The protracted Redondo Beach election season – a turbulent six-month affair – will not come to an official close until July 23.
Tuesday’s run-off election yielded results for races in Districts 1 and 4, but after all the votes were in, the mayoral race was too close to call. Its result remains contingent upon the tallying of provisional ballots.
According to semi-official results, things are looking good for District 1 councilmember Steve Aspel, who is defeating District 5 councilmember Matt Kilroy with just 148 votes, or 50.9 percent of the total. Still, 631 provisional ballots remain to be counted. City Clerk Eleanor Manzano will announce the final run-off results at noon on Monday at City Hall.
“Matt’s on pins and needles and I’m on pins and needles and the city’s on pins and needles because we can’t call it,” Aspel said at his election party Tuesday night.
“The city’s kind of in limbo for a week. I wish there was a better system but that’s the system we have and that’s the way it is.”
Aspel professed to be unsurprised at the narrowness of the mayoral race, identifying the “political climate and all the negative campaigning going on lately” as indicators that the results would be slim. Still, he is hopeful that he will be the city’s next mayor.
“I think I’ll win but I wouldn’t make the victory speech just yet because it’s too soon,” he said.
In District 1, Riviera Village businessman Jeff Ginsburg defeated rival Jim Light, an active political figure for over a decade, with 59.1 percent of the vote.
Political consultant Steve Sammarco defeated library commissioner Jan Jeffreys in District 4 by just 112 votes, taking 54.5 percent of the total.
No one candidate received a clear majority in the race for city treasurer.
So far incumbent councilmember Steve Diels is leading the charge with 39.1 percent of the vote, followed by finance professional Dawn Esser with 37.9 percent of the total. Former councilmember Chris Cagle ended up with 1,753 votes, or 22.9 percent of the total.
A run-off to determine the city’s next treasurer has been set for July 23. Manzano said it is the City Council’s prerogative to conduct the election by mail, which would cut costs considerably.
She also noted Tuesday’s run-off marked the “first time in history” that the vote-by-mail turnout was higher than that recorded at precinct polling places.
Of the 44,418 registered voters in Redondo Beach, 8,092 people voted – 5,015 of them by mail, and 3,077 of them in person.
