Bond appears to fail with only 55% approval — levy passes

Updated Feb. 10 at 11 a.m.

The San Juan County Elections office reports that, as of Feb. 10, Orcas Islanders appears to have approved the Orcas Island School District’s proposed levy, but denied a proposed bond measure.

With 1,000 votes left to count, the School Facilities Improvement General Obligation Bond vote has come in with 55.16% approval, or 1,026 votes counted in favor of the measure. 834 votes, or 44.84%, reject the bond. Sixty percent voter approval is required to pass the bond.

The Orcas Island School District’s maintenance and operations levy will apparently be approved, with 1,266 votes, or 67.74% of the votes counted being in favor of the levy; 603 votes or 32.26% of the votes counted have rejected the levy .

County Communications Program Manager Stan Matthews reported at 10 a.m. on Feb 10:

“Ballots deposited in ballot drop off boxes on Lopez and Orcas were collected at 8 p.m. last night, but will not arrive at the election’s department for counting until today.

“As of the end of the evening on Tuesday, a total of 5,339 ballots had been counted and a estimated 1000 ballots remain to be tallied. 11,159 people are registered to vote in San Juan County. County Auditor Milene Henley said Wednesday morning that it does not appear that there are enough outstanding ballots to affect the outcome of any of the issues.”

Updated results and more information about the individual issues is available on the County Elections website at: https://wei.secstate.wa.gov/sanjuan/Pages/default.aspx

The first accounting of the Feb. 9 vote was at 8:24 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 9. The next reckoning will be announced at 5 p.m. on Feb. 12. Final election results will be announced Feb. 24.