Late withdrawals by candidates for positions on the Edmonds School Board and the Snohomish County Fire District 1 board on 2015 ballots have reduced the number of positions on the Aug. 4 primary ballot.
When the May 11-15 filing week ended Friday, the two positions had three candidates each, meaning that each would need a primary to reduce the field to two for the Nov. 3 general election. Then two candidates for the school position and one for the fire district position withdrew Monday, the final day to withdraw a name from the ballot.
The two school district withdrawals were from Director District 4 candidates Michael Arendt and Monica Wheaton, both of Lynnwood. Their withdrawal advances former board member Susan Phillips to the general election without a primary and leaves her unopposed in November.
Phillips won election to the position in 2009 and 2013 but resigned in early 2014 due to a family reason. Other board members then appointed April Nowak to replace Phillips. Nowak said in March that she planned to run for the last two years of the term, but she said last week that she had to change her mind, citing her own family reasons. Phillips now is running for the last two years of the term that she won in 2013.
Citizens throughout the school district vote for candidates from each of five director districts, but all board members must live in the director districts they represent.
The Edmonds School District includes the cities of Edmonds, Lynnwood, and Mountlake Terrace, the town of Woodway, most of the city of Brier, and unincorporated areas of South Snohomish County near those municipalities.
Director District 4 in the central part of the school district includes parts of the city of Edmonds and most of the city of Lynnwood on both sides of Highway 99. It includes Edmonds-Woodway High School, College Place elementary and middle schools and Lynnwood Elementary School.
In Fire District 1, commission position 2 had three candidates at the close of filing Friday, but Jared C. Karstetter Jr. withdrew Monday, leaving candidate Mike Luke and incumbent Richard Schrock to advance automatically to the November general election for a six-year term.
Another Fire District 1 position will go directly to November. It will match incumbent Commissioner Bob Meador with a candidate he defeated two years ago for a short term, Erica Ash.
Fire District 1 includes unincorporated areas of Snohomish County south of Everett. The district provides fire service to the cities of Brier, Edmonds, Lynnwood and Mountlake Terrace, but those cities are not a part of the district.
One school district position that will be on the primary ballot is the position that Gary Noble holds representing Director District 3.
Noble has two challengers to represent Director District 3. The challengers are Mary Murphy and Mark Norton, both of Lynnwood. Director District 3 in the northeast part of the school district includes the area around Lynnwood High School, Martha Lake Elementary School, Oak Heights Elementary School and Spruce Elementary School.
Two other board positions will appear on the November ballot with no primary.
One is the position that Kory DeMun is giving up representing Director District 1 in the southwest corner of the school district. Director District 1 includes Woodway, the south part of the City of Edmonds and nearby unincorporated areas, and the southwest corner of Mountlake Terrace.
The election matches business executive Bill Willcock and 32nd District Democratic chairwoman Carin Chase.
Incumbent Diana White will run unopposed in Director District 5. White represents Director District 5 in the northwest part of the school district, including the Lynndale and Meadowdale areas and the north part of the City of Edmonds.
The only board position not on 2015 ballots is the one that Ann McMurray represents from Director District 2 in the southeast part of the school district, including most of Mountlake Terrace and all of Brier.
Evan Smith can be reached at schsmith@frontier.com.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
