Nechero loses by 1
Wall, Butler in runoff, amendment OK’d

Campaign signs adorn a fence in front of scultures on property at Coal Avenue and Puerco Drive Tuesday. Tuesday's election was for two city council seats and city charter ammendment. — © 2009 Gallup Independent / Cable Hoover

Copyright © 2009
Gallup Independent
By Gaye Brown de Alvarez and Bill Donovan
Staff writers

GALLUP — There was no president, senator, mayor or amendment to the U.S. constitution on Tuesday’s ballot.

It was an election for city councilor in two districts and a change to how the votes are counted and what constitutes the need for a run-off election.

The only candidate for City Council who could get to bed Tuesday night knowing for sure that he won or lost was Steve Seeger, who finished third in the race for the District 3.

As a result of that, Emmett Bryan Wall, who came in a surprise first with 314 votes, will be in a run-off election with incumbent Pat Butler, who received 276 votes to Seeger’s 265.

Another big surprise Tuesday was former city economic development director Mike Enfield defeating incumbent Bill Nechero by one vote, 183 to 182, in the District 1 race.

That’s so close that the canvassing that’s scheduled to take place on Thursday may change it, or Nechero may decide to petition the courts for a recount. There was no victory speech from Enfield Tuesday, although he did remark on the low turnout not only in the districts where there were no council races but overall.

Only about 11 percent of city voters cast their ballots in this election, which is even low for a non-mayoral race in Gallup.

Only six voters showed up all day to vote at the new Westside Fire station. The vote by district showed 367 came out for the northside race, 857 for the southside and only 145 total for both the east side and west side districts.

This may have also helped supporters who wanted to get an amendment to the city’s charter passed which would change the rule under which run-off elections would be required. If the winner gets less than 40 percent, no runoff would be required if he has a 10 percent higher victory over the person who came in second.

That won’t go into effect until the next election, but even if it did in this election, it wouldn’t make a difference because the vote totals for Wall and Butler were so close.

Looking at the closeness of the race for the northside district race, City Hall officials were saying that Enfield may have won the race because of his underdog status. Very few people in the city expected him to win because he was relatively unknown. As a result, the theory is that many hard-core Nechero supporters may have thought they didn’t have to go to the polls.

To his credit, however, Enfield never thought of himself as a total underdog, saying throughout the race that if voters in his district had a chance to hear what he had to say, he felt he would win. He said Tuesday that he spent a lot of time and hit practically every house on the south side of his district and most of the houses on the north side of his district.

So as it stands right now, Enfield has defeated Nechero and Wall and Butler are set to go at it again in a run off election, which will be scheduled 30 days after the vote totals for this election are made final.

Districts 2 and 4 had nothing on the ballot but an “awkwardly-worded” city charter change:

It read as follows:

“Shall Article VI, Section 6 (A) of the Gallup City Charter be amended to read: If no candidate receives 40 percent of the votes cast for a particular office and the second place candidate receives less than 10 percent fewer of the votes cast for a particular office than the leading candidate, a runoff election shall be held within 30 days after certification of the results of the election.”

District 1

Liana Madrid, who was at the Octavia Fellin Public Library around 9 a.m. to vote for District 1 city councilor, was asked if she understood the amendment that was on the ballot.
“No, I didn’t,” she said.

The library, one of two polling places for District 1, had seen about 15 voters since 7 a.m. by the time 9:45 rolled around, and they were there to vote for either Bill Nechero or Mike Enfield.

Voter Martin Neal was asked if he understood the amendment when he came in to vote.

“Yes,” he said, “I understood it but they should have said howit stands now. It’s kind of blurry.”

District 1 voters Andrew Bradley and Sig Martinez both said they understood how the amendment read.

There were 14 District 1 voters at the Northside fire station by 9 a.m., and voters Richard Andrade and Lupe Andrade said they both understood the amendment. One poll worker said voting was slow but steady, and it was better than the last school board election, where she worked at the Larry Brian Mitchell Recreation Center and they only had 11 voters in 12 hours.

District 2

By noon, there were only three voters at Rocky View Elementary school, one of two polling places for District 2, where there were no candidates on the ballot. But there were lots of children to watch, and a lot of activity. Leona Torriv, one of the poll workers said one of the young students asked her “what are you doing?” She told the girl people were voting for the city council. “What’s that?” the student asked and another child answered her. “That’s for the boss of Gallup!”

District 3

District 3 was where all the action was, with three candidates on the ballot and an amendment that could affect the outcome of the election between Pat Butler, Steve Seeger and Emmett Brian Wall. By 11:30, the Red Rock Elementary school had about 90 voters and they were still trickling in.

Joyce and Dave Lebeck said they talked about the amendment the night before, so they both understood it.

District 3 voters Morris Doty, Ed Brown, Mary Batson and Paula Garcia all said they understood the amendment.

County Attorney Doug Decker, who was at the elementary school to vote, said that he “understands what they are trying to do but it is worded awkwardly.” Decker said he was part of the recount for Ralph Richards about two years ago, which brought about the effort to change the city charter wording.

District 4

At the Westside Fire Station on Rico Street, one of the polling places for District 4, there had been no voters by 11 a.m. With no candidates for city council on the ballot, the poll workers said they didn’t expect a large turnout. They kept a close eye on the parking lot outside, ready to assist anyone who was trying to get in the building to vote.

“We can’t get this door unlocked,” poll worker Lupe Reyes said.