It’s official.
District 3 Guilford County Commissioner Justin Conrad gets to keep that seat for another four years after the Guilford County Board of Elections conducted a recount and found that they got it exactly right the first time.
The Guilford County Board of Elections met at 11 a.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 20 and, for two hours, went back through the votes of the 22 precincts in District 3 and ruled that Conrad, the Republican in the race, had 14,335 votes while Democratic contender Tracy Lamothe had 14,119.
Lamothe was at the meeting in the Blue Room of the Old Guilford County Court House, but Conrad, the eventual winner was not.
Guilford County Elections Director Charlie Collicutt said after the meeting that he wasn’t surprised the vote count remained exactly the same. In the past, vote changes in recounts have been few and far between and Lamothe needed to overcome a deficit of more than 200 votes.
Lamothe spoke to the election board members and to Collicutt after the decision came back. She told them she appreciated their effort a great deal and she thanked them for the time and thought they had put into the process.
Lamothe said after the meeting that she did plan to run for office again even though she fell a little short in this first attempt.
“I may not run for the same seat,” she said, “but I do intend to run again for something.”
She said she was disappointed at not winning the race but added that she was pleased at how smooth the post-election process had gone.
The outcome of the District 3 race will have huge implications for Guilford County since it means that the Board of Commissioners will maintain a 5-to-4 Republican majority.
