South Pasadena’s $80 million streets bond and incumbent Councilmember Michael Cacciotti are both well ahead in the first election night returns posted by the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk, as of about 9:30 p.m. Tuesday.
These are early, semi-official numbers. Thousands of city ballots remain to be counted, including vote center ballots and mail ballots still arriving through Nov. 10.
Measure SOS: 78.7 Percent At Early Count Time
Measure SOS, the South Pasadena Street/Road/Pothole Repair, 9-1-1 Safety Measure, has 5,393 yes votes (78.68 percent) to 1,461 no votes (21.32 percent).
As a general obligation bond, the measure needs a two-thirds supermajority, or 66.67 percent, to pass. It is running about 12 points above that line.
The bond would authorize $80 million for streets, roads, sidewalks, potholes, storm drains and evacuation routes. The county’s ballot summary puts the average cost at $33 per $100,000 of assessed property value, raising about $4.4 million a year while the bonds are outstanding.
To fall below two-thirds, the measure would have to lose the remaining ballots outright. If citywide turnout reaches about 60 percent, roughly 4,000 more votes remain on the measure, and “no” would need to win a majority of them. Nothing in the early count points that way.
District 4: Cacciotti 740, Stanton-Trehan 388
In the city’s only contested council race, Cacciotti has 740 votes (65.60 percent) to 388 (34.40 percent) for challenger Nevin Stanton-Trehan, the chair of the city’s Finance Commission. That is a lead of 352 votes.
Cacciotti was first elected to the council in 2001.
How Much Of The Vote Is In
Going into Election Day, 18,315 ballots had been mailed to South Pasadena voters, according to available elections data. The 6,854 votes cast so far on Measure SOS equal about 37 percent of that total. In District 4, the 1,128 votes counted equal about 33 percent of the district’s 3,371 mailed ballots.
By Monday, 5,510 city ballots had already been returned, so the first count is made up largely of early mail ballots. Those ballots came disproportionately from voters 65 and older, who had returned their ballots at roughly three times the rate of voters under 35.
If District 4 turnout lands near 55 to 60 percent, roughly 700 to 900 district votes are still out. To catch up, Stanton-Trehan would need to win those by about 40 points or more, a reversal of the current trend.
We Keep Watching The Count Through The Week
Los Angeles County continues posting updates through the night. On Nov. 4, 5 and 6, updates post at 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. Starting Nov. 7, updates post daily between 4 and 5 p.m. Mail ballots postmarked by Election Day count if they arrive by Nov. 10, and the county expects to keep counting through Nov. 26.
The South Pasadenan will update these results as new counts come in.
