With few contested races on the ballot, it was a relatively slow Election Day Tuesday in La Plata County. Voters were asked to weigh in on races for county, regional and congressional seats.
County Clerk and Recorder Tiffany Lee had received 10,017 ballots as of 2:45 p.m., which was just shy of 24% turnout. She expected somewhere between 25% and 30% of voters to cast a ballot by 7 p.m.
On the Democratic ballot, only a race for an at-large seat on the University of Colorado Board of Regents was contested.
The lack for choices was a little bit disappointing for Democratic voter Ted Davis.
“It was kind of a strange voting process, especially with a position that I, frankly, didn’t know was even voted on,” he said, referring to the Board of Regents race. “I did do some research and ... and tried to make an informed decision.”
Voters who participated in the Republican primary weighed in on a six-way race for the GOP nomination for the 3rd Congressional District seat currently held by Rep. Lauren Boebert. The congresswoman announced in December that she would seek reelection in Colorado’s 4th Congressional District, on the east side of Colorado.
Whoever wins the nomination will face presumptive Democratic nominee Adam Frisch in November. In 2022, Frisch nearly unseated Boebert but lost by a margin of 546 votes.
The 53% of La Plata County voters who are unaffiliated could choose to vote in either primary. Joel Bratsch was one such voter.
“This wasn’t very exciting,” he said.
Bratsch, who tends to lean left, voted the Democratic ballot.
“I haven’t traditionally voted Republican, so I’m going to let them battle it out,” he said. “… Had I done more research, I might’ve been like ‘who do I want contesting Adam Frisch.’ But I didn’t go that far.”
Election coverage
Results from Tuesday’s primary election arrived after 7 p.m. Because of The Durango Herald’s print deadline, results do not appear in today’s print edition. Full coverage and results will appear in Friday’s print edition.
Given the nine-point advantage that Republicans have in the 3rd Congressional District, unaffiliated voter Sarah Kelly said she thought her vote would have the biggest impact if she voted the Republican ballot.
In line with her independent status, Kelly said she wanted a congressional candidate who was not beholden to a presidential candidate. She voted for Curtis McCrackin, a Cedaredge business owner who has managed and overseen real estate and general contracting companies.
“He just seemed reasonable, I agree with him on issues of the budget being too high,” she said. “I’d like to see us … start paying the budget off.”
Things will be far more interesting in November, voters agree, when Democrats and Republicans face off.
For Lee, the quiet primary is an opportunity to ensure that her staff and volunteers are trained and that all her election procedure manuals are up to date.
Even her slate of experienced election judges must be trained on the new security protocols that are now necessary given the scrutiny and threats that county election officials sometimes face.
In the event of a natural disaster or an active shooter, she needs staff to be ready to keep counting ballots – or stop, if necessary, to protect their safety.
“We've always had procedure manuals for the election judges, but we're just making sure that they're as informative and clear as they possibly can be before November,” Lee said.
rschafir@durangoherald.com
