C a l i f o r n i a ’ s O l d e s t N e w s pa p e r – E s t. 18 51
Volume 169 • Issue 130 | 75¢
mtdemocrat.com
Monday, November 9, 2020
Incumbents likely ousted at GDPUD Dawn Hodson Staff writer With 74.4% percent of the vote in as of Nov. 5, two newcomers to the Georgetown Divide Public Utility District Board of Directors Mike Thornbrough appear to have won seats. Coming in with the most votes to date is Mike Thornbrough with 3,398 votes. In second place is Mitch MacDonald, garnering 2,936 votes. In third Mitch MacDonald place with 1,697 votes is incumbent Dane Wadle and incumbent David Halpin had 1,618 votes. Contacted by the Mountain Democrat for a comment on the election outcome, Wadle sent his congratulations to Thornbrough and MacDonald for their “impressive victory,” wishing them all the best. He also thanked GDPUD customers for the opportunity to serve as their representative for the past four years. Wadle said he believed the rate increase figured into the election outcome and that he could have spent more time explaining to the community the reasons behind votes by the board and how those decisions were good for the community. But despite the challenges and criticism sometimes leveled at the board, Wadle said he enjoyed the opportunity to serve because he thinks the board did a lot of good things during his term. MacDonald said he anticipated that he and Thornbrough would win “if the facts got out there” and because of their involvement in the community. MacDonald, a former member of the finance committee and Auburn Lake Trails resident, said there were four straws that broke the camel’s back, including who the board appointed to the finance committee, the removal of two members of the finance committee, suspending the finance committee from meeting due to the COVID-19 pandemic and finally disbanding the finance committee altogether in June. He said he thinks the community didn’t like the n
See GDPUD, page A2
Mountain Democrat photo by Dawn Hodson
Assistant Registrar of Voters Linda Webster keeps a close tab on votes remaining to be processed by Elections Department staff and volunteers Thursday morning.
The count goes on Thomas Frey Staff writer Elections Department staff and volunteers are working tirelessly to tabulate all ballots submitted by El Dorado County voters. Going through each ballot takes several steps and the team at the elections office is keeping busy processing ballots, ciphering out ballots from other counties, making sure the signature on the envelope matches the signature on the ballot and manually inputting ballots when necessary. On election night there were about 30 volunteers doing those jobs and about 15 extra-help employees hired just for the election. Many are also helping outside the elections office. At exactly 8 p.m. on Election Day pairs of two were at each of the drop-box locations in El Dorado County where they picked up ballots to take back to the elections office. The team is also aided by machines that make processing ballots much faster. “This is the smoothest (election night) here that I have been through,” said Assistant Registrar of Voters Linda Webster. The machines, which can go through as many 20,000 ballots an hour, cost about $850,000 — all of which came from grants the elections office received. But good old customer service can’t be matched by machines. Ted Castle, a precinct specialist, would drive out to homes of people who were unable to deliver their ballot to a drop box. He did that on his own time, according to Registrar of Voters Bill O’Neill. Castle’s tasks when he isn’t helping the community is to make sure more than 200,000 resident have the correct measures and candidates on their ballots based
on where they reside. Currently more than 105,000 ballots (out of 135,201 registered voters) have been counted which top the 98,000 ballots that were counted in 2016. The El Dorado County Elections Department plans toerelease updated ballot counts every weekday at 5 p.m. until every ballot has been counted.
El Dorado County Registrar of Voters Bill O’Neill, talks Thursday morning about how smoothly election night went due to all the experienced help he can count on combined with new equipment they have invested in that speeds up processing ballots.
Organizations unite in homeless camp cleanup Kevin Christensen Staff writer Organizers and volunteers with the Lighted Candle and newly formed nonprofit Sierra Harm Reduction Coalition, along with city of Placerville staff, spent Election Day assisting people living at a homeless encampment on Upper Broadway in Placerville. With the help of camp occupants trash was bagged up and hauled off with the city of Placerville providing garbage trucks and police officers directing traffic. “Today’s cleanup was not intended to be on Election Day but the coordination with the city just worked out (for) today,” said Lighted Candle founder Pete Brown. “Election day is about fulfilling our civic duties by voting and I believe today’s cleanup reflected that as well because it’s our civic duty to help our community and respect everyone.” Brown explained the day’s massive cleanup effort, which he described as
a “hazmat situation,” was a result of a larger problem between the homeless population in Placerville and what he sees as a lack of assistance. The Lighted Candle has actually been coordinating dump runs at homeless encampments every other Tuesday, throughout the year. “We had a large presence at a city council meeting around January and we made a presentation imploring the city to come up with approximately $150 every two weeks for dump fees and we would continue to provide free labor, vehicles and gasoline,” said Brown. “The city and El Dorado Disposal delayed a couple of months before giving us what I feel was a rather token showing of support, with very limited vouchers good for only two-and-a-half cubic yards of trash, or less than one-third of what we would normally encounter bi-weekly before the meeting.” Representatives with Sierra Harm Reduction Coalition’s also joined in n
See Homeless, page A6
Mountain Democrat photo by Kevin Christensen
Volunteers and organizers with the Lighted Candle and Sierra Harm Coalition fill a dump truck provided by the city of Placerville and El Dorado Disposal to help clean up a homeless camp on Upper Broadway in Placerville Tuesday.
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