Election Update: Some Merced County candidates make big gains, as more votes are counted

Merced County Registrar of Voters officials on Monday counted another 4,073 ballots from last week’s election, bringing the total number of ballots counted to 78,413 since Saturday.

In terms of top local races that are still being closely watched, one of the most dramatic reversals has been the race for Merced City Council District 1.

In that three-candidate race, local activist Jesse Ornelas had trailed behind longtime educator Joel Knox by only six votes. Since last week, however, Ornelas has only gained momentum, on Monday leading Knox by 86 votes — 1,358 votes to 1,272 respectively.

Meanwhile, third candidate Louis Smith trails behind Ornelas and Knox with 408 votes.

The other Merced City Council races have not been quite as dramatic. Local prosecutor Matthew Serratto remains the likely victor in the Merced mayor’s race, miles ahead of his nearest contender Michael Belluomini.

Serratto has 52.27% of the vote to Belluomini’s 20.17%. The other challengers in the mayor’s race —Anthony Martinez and Monica Kay Villa — have 14.16% and 13.15% respectively.

In Merced City Council District 3, Bertha Perez continues to lead Allen Brooks, 51.14% to 48.58% respectively.

In Merced City Council District 5, Sarah Boyle maintains her lead over Jeremy Martinez, 52.97% to 46.68%

In the Merced County Board of Supervisor’s District 2 race, Josh Pedrozo continues to move closer to unseating incumbent Lee Lor.

Pedrozo now has 10,005 votes over Lor’s 9,045 — 52.52% to 47.48% respectively.

In the quest for Los Banos mayor, music teacher and longtime councilman Tom Faria continues to gain momentum over former police officer Paul Llanez, 5,952 votes over 5,910 respectively. On election night Faria had been in the lead, but only by 13 votes.

In the Livingston mayor’s race, Juan Aguilar Jr. leads incumbent Gurpal S. Samra 2,153 votes to 1,884.

All eligible voters this year were sent mail-in ballots in an effort to promote physical distancing while voting amid the novel coronavirus pandemic. Ballots that were postmarked by Election Day are still valid.

When processing ballots, each signature must be verified. If the signature doesn’t match the signature on file, the voter is notified.

Voter participation history is updated for every voter who turned in a ballot. Every mail-in envelope is opened, the ballot is extracted and flattened. Each ballot is fed through the high speed ballot scanning equipment to tabulate them.

California law provides that vote-by-mail ballots may be accepted through Friday, Nov. 20 provided that they are postmarked on or before Nov. 3, 2020.

Final results are due no later than Dec. 5, the registrar has said.

For the full list of local election results, visit the registrar’s website.

This story was originally published November 9, 2020 at 7:17 PM.