Charles “Chuck” Younger and Bobby Patrick appear to be heading for a runoff election to see who will replace the late Terry Brown in the state Senate.
Unofficial results show Younger garnered 4,788 votes, or 41.4 percent, while Patrick received 3,003, or 26 percent, during today’s election. Since neither candidate got a 50-percent-plus-one majority vote, they will meet in a Nov. 25 runoff.
These results do not include absentee or affidavit ballots.
The winner of the District 17 Senate race will replace Brown in next year’s legislative session. Brown died in September after a battle with cancer. The term expires at the end of 2015.
There were two other candidates vying to take Brown’s seat.
William “Bill” Canon received 2,347 votes, or 20.3 percent, while Bill Gavin received 1,395, or 12.1 percent, according to unofficial results.
Younger, 51, has farmed and ranched in Lowndes and Monroe counties for more than 30 years. Patrick, 68, retired in 2011 after nearly 40 years as an insurance agent.
State senators are paid a $10,000 salary each year plus per diem.
The only judicial race in the Golden Triangle with more than one candidate was for District 16 Circuit Court Judge, Place 3. That race pitted 65-year-old incumbent Lee Coleman against 48-year-old challenger Monique Montgomery.
Coleman, roughly two hours after the polls closed today, appeared to have fended off Montgomery’s challenge.
According to unofficial results, he received 8,367 votes to Montgomery’s 4,782 in Lowndes County, and 5,163 votes Montgomery’s 2,741 in Oktibehha County. In Clay County, with only 10 out of 14 precincts reporting, Coleman had garnered 1,751 votes to Montgomery’s 1,572. Meanwhile in Noxubee County, with only five of eight precincts reporting, Montgomery held a 832 to 624 lead.
For complete coverage of the election, including reaction from all candidates and unofficial vote totals in the District 16 Circuit Court Judge, Place 3 race, see Wednesday’s Dispatch.
William Browning was managing editor for The Dispatch until June 2016.
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