Election results are now final in Fresno County. But a tie leaves one race in limbo
Four weeks after the Nov. 5 general election, the counting is complete and the final official results are in for contests across Fresno County.
And, among more than 90 individual seats on city councils, school boards and other municipal offices, there’s one dead-even tie that could come down to a recount or drawing of lots to decide the winner.
In the Laguna Irrigation District’s Division 2, which sits on the Fresno County side of the Kings River just west of Laton, board President Frank Zonneveld, the incumbent, finished in a dead heat with challenger Wes Harmon. Each of the candidates received 101 votes.
The division, which encompasses about 15 square miles, only has 295 registered voters, of whom 215 cast ballots. Of those, 13 voters did not mark a choice between Zonneveld and Harmon, any one of which could have tipped the election one way or another.
Fresno County Clerk/Registrar of Voters James Kus said either candidate, or any voter, can request a recount in writing by 5 p.m. Sunday, the 31st day following the election. But Kus said he believes a recount would not change the results.
“I’m very certain of how well our tabulation system works,” Kus told The Bee on Wednesday. “I believe those numbers are the absolute accurate count of those ballots.”
The last true tie that Kus can recall happening in a Fresno County election was in 1996, when a Kingsburg City Council race ended in a dead heat. A controversial coin toss tried to determine a winner between incumbent Rick Walley and challenger Paul Kruper. The Bee reported at that time that many people in attendance at the coin toss thought they heard Walley call heads, but when the coin came up tails, Walley said that’s what he called, and returned to his seat on the council dais.
The disputed coin toss led to a court case in which a private judge ultimately decided — more than four months after the election — that Kruper was the rightful winner.
In the Laton/Riverdale area, the only thing certain now is that the swearing in of the director to represent District 2, which had been planned for Friday, won’t be happening. Another seat on the board, representing Division 4 which straddles the Fresno-Kings county line, was won by Kevin Hodges over incumbent Jake Miller, 133 votes to 110, so Hodges will be sworn in to office this week.
Zonneveld, whose family has dairies and farms crops in both Fresno and Kings counties, was Kings County’s 2019 Agriculturist of the Year. Harmon is a local well driller who based his campaign on prioritizing groundwater recharge projects.
County supervisor, city council races now official
With official results posted Tuesday afternoon from the Nov. 5 election, Fresno City Council members Garry Bredefeld and Luis Chavez are now bound for the Fresno County Board of Supervisors.
Bredefeld, a two-term council member who was ineligible to seek re-election because of term limits, defeated incumbent Supervisor Steve Brandau for the District 2 seat on the county board, representing northeast and northwest Fresno.
Chavez, who was midway through his current City Council term in southeast Fresno, defeated incumbent District 3 Supervisor Sal Quintero.
Chavez’ win means there will be a vacancy on the City Council, and the potential game of musical chairs is already starting. On Wednesday, a day after the Nov. 5 results were declared official, Chavez’ wife, Elizabeth Jonasson Rosas announced that she will be running in a special election to succeed him.
Jonasson Rosas had just won reelection to a third four-year term on the Fresno Unified School District board of trustees representing the Roosevelt High area of southeast Fresno. She handily defeated challenger Joseph Aquino. If she were to win the special city council election, it would in turn create a vacancy on the Fresno Unified board.
“I’m proud to represent a good portion of the council area on the school board,” Jonasson Rosas told The Bee on Wednesday. “If the voters are so willing, I’ll be proud to represent the district in a new capacity on the City Council.”
She added that she did not believe voters would see her decision to run for the city council — only a day after her reelection to the school board was finalized — as a matter of political opportunism. “Of course, it will be up to the will of the voters,” Jonasson Rosas said.
Even before a special election to fill Chavez’ seat, there will be a new face on the Fresno City Council. Nick Richardson, a Marine Corps Reserve officer and business owner, defeated another first-time candidate, attorney Roger Bonakdar, to replace Bredefeld as the representative for District 6 encompassing northeast Fresno.
Countywide, a total of 330,932 voters cast ballots in the general election, representing a turnout of 64.7% of Fresno County’s 511,349 registered voters. That’s well short of turnout from the 2020 presidential election, in which voter turnout was almost 75%, with more than 370,000 ballots cast out of about 495,800 registered voters.
Here is the full compilation of final, official results of contested Nov. 5 election races across Fresno County for school boards, small cities, special districts, local school bonds and other municipal ballot measures.
This story was originally published December 4, 2024 at 2:24 PM.
CORRECTION: This story has been corrected to reflect that Elizabeth Jonasson Rosas was elected on Nov. 5 to a third four-year term on the Fresno Unified School District Board of Trustees representing the Roosevelt High School area.
