Lee and Worth sheriffs re-elected; Dougherty SPLOSTs OK’d

LEESBURG — Lee County voters returned Sheriff Reggie Rachals to office with a resounding victory in the general election Tuesday, while Dougherty County voters were headed toward overwhelmingly voting to continue a pair of special 1 percent sales taxes.

With all precincts reporting, Rachals had outpolled his independent challenger, Sandra Presley-Fordham, 10,730-3,039 in unofficial returns, to earn his third term in office.

“I feel grateful and humbled that the Lee County citizens have the faith and confidence in me to re-elect me as their sheriff,” Rachels said. “I’ve enjoyed being their sheriff. I’m looking forward to serving four more years.”

Meanwhile, in the city of Dawson, former Mayor Robert Albritten was returned to that office, ousting embattled incumbent Christopher Wright.

T. Gamble was elected in a countywide ballot to serve as chairman of the Terrell County Commission. The new commission chair-elect defeated Larry Faust in the race to take the place of Wilbur T. Gamble Jr., his father. In unofficial results, Gamble, an independent, received 2,197 votes. Faust, a Democrat, got 1,660 votes.

In Dougherty County, with all 28 precincts reporting, voters were headed toward overwhelmingly approving a pair of special tax referendums, supporting the city/county SPLOST VII by a 23,015-9,531 vote and the education-only E-SPLOST 23,723-9,0430.

The House District 151 contest was the lone state legislative political race that involved Dougherty County voters. Incumbent Gerald Greene, R-Cuthbert, was assured the opportunity to serve his 17th term as state House District 151 representative, outpolling independent candidate the Rev. Kenneth Zachary 12,668-7,723.

Greene said he received a promising sign election morning.

“I bought a winning (scratch-off) lottery ticket this morning, so I knew it was going to be a good day,” the Cuthbert Republican said. “Actually, I was alone at church early this morning, at 5:45, which has become a ritual. The Lord and I had a good conversation. Then, while I visited all the precincts, the people were so encouraging. I take that to heart.

“I view the outcome as the people in my district giving me a new contract and a mandate to do their business. The people here want someone who will listen to them as their representative, someone who cares about them.”

City voters in Dawson had to choose between Wright, who was suspended from the mayor’s office on Oct. 13 by Gov. Nathan Deal after being indicted on charges that include aggravated child molestation and aggravated sodomy, and their former Mayor Albritten.

During Albritten’s 32 years in office, he faced 28 fraud and forgery charges and pleaded guilty to drunk driving before ultimately being ousted by Wright in 2012. Of the fraud and forgery charges, he was acquitted of seven and pleaded no-contest to nine of them.

Albritten received 1,067 votes to Wright’s 578 in unofficial results.

In Worth County, incumbent Sheriff Jeff Hobby and Coroner Johnny Johnson were re-elected to their offices, outdistancing challengers Tracy Jones and Jonathan Luke, respectively.

With all 15 precincts reporting, Hobby had outpolled Jones 5,506-2,648, while Johnson had 5,764 votes to Luke’s 2,191.

An early-morning snafu at the Christ United Methodist Church precinct on Byron Plantation Road in Dougherty County slowed the process to a crawl there just after polls opened. Lines began to back up when one of the precinct’s Express Poll devices failed to operate. The devices are not voting machines, but “charge” the familiar yellow voting cards with voter information. An uncharged card will not function in a voting machine.

“We had a fairly long line of people and most people understood when we explained the problem to them,” precinct manager Clint Melton said. “The crowd lightened up after 9, and it’s been fairly smooth since then.”

Dougherty County Election Board Chair Walter Blankenship said having just one working Express Poll device was an inconvenience, but he wasn’t overly concerned.

“In the real world, computers go down all the time,” he said. “If it were a voting machine, we could just swap it out. But we have a limited number of the Express Poll devices, and when only one is working it slows everybody down.”

Staff writers Brad McEwen and Jennifer Parks contributed to this report.