A runoff election to determine the winner of the Seat 2 race for the Apopka City Council will be held Tuesday, April 10. Polls in the two precincts will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Voting, however, has been going on for nearly three weeks as the vote-by-mail ballots were sent out shortly after the March 13 first election. As of the morning of Thursday, April 5, more than 1,600 Apopka voters had sent in their vote-by-mail ballots in the race between first-term incumbent Diane Velazquez and challenger Alice Nolan.
Those two were the top vote-getters in the March 13 election that also saw Orange County Commissioner Bryan Nelson handily defeat first-term Mayor Joe Kilsheimer.
In the Seat 1 City Council race, Suzanne Kidd got the most votes in the March 13 election, and it appeared that she and Alexander Smith would be headed to an April 10 runoff. However, less than a week following the March 13 election, Kidd dropped out of the race, handing Seat 1 to Smith.
Both Smith and Kidd were political newcomers. Smith will take over for longtime City Commissioner Billie Dean, who elected not to run again after serving for 24 years.
In a statement she released when she dropped out, Kidd said she didn’t wish to serve on the City Council since Kilsheimer lost his bid for re-election.
“Had Mayor Kilsheimer won re-election, there is almost no limit to the positive forward strides we as a city were making,” Kidd wrote. “But when 80 percent of Apopka’s voters chose not to vote, declining to express at the ballot box their hopes for progress, they allowed 4,100 people to change the direction of this city in a way I could not, in good conscience, and in loyalty to my volunteers and supporters, allow myself to agree with or participate in.”
Gene Knight finished third while Theresa Mott was fourth in the Seat 1 race.
In the March 13 election for Seat 2, Nolan received 39.7 percent of the vote while Velazquez got 37.5 percent. Leroy Bell and Alicia Koutsoulieris finished third and fourth, respectively, in the race.
The March 13 election drew 20.69 percent of Apopka’s eligible voters.
There are two precincts for the city election where 31,258 registered voters are eligible.
The traditional city voting site of the Apopka Community Center/VFW at 519 S. Central Avenue is for voters in Precinct 9104, while Precinct 9204 voters will cast their ballots at the Northwest Recreation Complex at 3710 Jason Dwelley Parkway. The office is next to the tennis courts at the large complex.
The map for the two precincts divides the city into basic north and south precincts with all of the new precinct – No. 9204 – north of U.S. Highway 441 and most of traditional precinct No. 9104 south of U.S. 441, although parts of downtown Apopka and all of Errol Estate are in the traditional precinct, as well.
The swearing-in ceremony is scheduled for Tuesday, April 24, that will include Mayor-elect Nelson, Commissioner-elect Smith, and the winner of the Velazquez-Nolan runoff election.
This story appears in its entirety in the Friday, April 6, edition of The Apopka Chief.
