DANA POINT : Final Vote Totals in Close Race Expected

Final results are expected today in the close City Council race where only 81 votes separate the top four finishers.

As of Monday, it appeared Toni Gallagher, incumbent Karen Lloreda and Harold R. Kaufman have been elected to the three open seats on the five-member council, but 2,300 ballots countywide remain to be counted, said Cathy Catlett, the assistant city clerk.

The latest tallies show Gallagher and Lloreda in a dead heat with 2,787 votes each, Kaufman with 2,754 votes and Ernest Nelson with 2,706 votes.

In fifth place and apparently out of the race is Bill Shepherd with 2,623 votes.

The remaining uncounted votes include absentee ballots turned in at polling places, provisional ballots, ballots that had write-in candidates and ballots that were damaged by the counting machines or ones that had to be duplicated for a variety of reasons, said Rosalyn Lever, the county’s assistant registrar of voters.

Lever could not estimate how many of the uncounted ballots belonged to Dana Point voters.

But city officials believe there are certain to be some local votes outstand ing because Dana Point resident Bonnie Streeter ran a write-in campaign for county sheriff.

“Nobody knows exactly how many Dana Point votes are left,” Catlett said. “Our numbers could change a little, change drastically or not change at all.”

A similar situation in the 1992 Dana Point council election ultimately cost then-Councilman Bill Bamattre his seat.

After all the straggling votes were tallied, current Councilman William L. Ossenmacher had nudged Bamattre aside for the victory.

Nelson, now the trailer for the final seat by 48 votes, remains hopeful today’s count might still help him win.

“I know there are quite a few people in Dana Point who did different write-ins,” Nelson said. “We could still be in pretty good shape. It just depends on how many there are.”