More than a week after the primary elections, the two candidates who’ll be moving on in the Aug. 11 Republican runoff for District 2 on the Cobb Board of Commissioners have been certified.
The Cobb Board of Registration and Elections on Friday certified that Fitz Johnson of Vinings and Andy Smith of East Cobb emerged as the top two finishers in a three-candidate race that was separated by fewer than 1,000 votes.
The board certified all of Cobb’s primary results on Friday, after a delayed process that included counting a record 107,000 absentee ballots.
According to the certified tabulations, Johnson received 6,656 votes, or 36.2 percent of the ballots cast.
Smith got 5,946 votes, or 32.2 percent. Kevin Nicholas, also of East Cobb, received 5,770 votes, or 31.4 percent. They were running to succeed retiring commissioner Bob Ott, with the GOP winner facing Jerica Richardson, the only Democratic candidate, in November.
Voting figures reported on the June 9 primary election day were very close, and remained that way as the absentee voting updates were added.
“Yes, it was very close, and maybe that’s the way it should be,” said Smith, a former member of the Cobb Planning Commission. “There were three very good candidates and I think District 2 would be well represented by any of them.”
Johnson, a first-time candidate for county office who previously ran for state school superintendent, won 24 of the 39 precincts in District 2, which includes most of East Cobb and some of the Smyrna-Vinings-Cumberland area.
He won 11 precincts in East Cobb, mostly by very slender margins (click here for a hover map with precinct totals).
“I’m not from East Cobb, and so we had to make sure we really got out in East Cobb a lot,” Johnson said.
Nicholas, a member of the Development Authority of Cobb County and a candidate for the Cobb County Board of Education in 2014, also was running for the commission for the first time.
After East Cobb News requested comment from Nicholas, he e-mailed a statement saying that “I am proud of the grass roots campaign we ran, representing our neighbors—not special interests, and a huge thank you to the thousands of voters who supported me.”
Johnson and Smith said they will keep stressing issues they heard a lot from voters, especially public safety, during the runoff campaign.
They both said they’re eager to do more in-person campaigning, as more restrictions on public gatherings in Georgia have been lifted.
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