Write-ins take mayoral seats in Tyler, Clarkfield
By Robert Wolfington IIIThe make-up of school boards, city councils and county boards will change around the region as newly elected officials take office next year.
Residents in Tyler and Clarkfield opted to use write-in votes to elect mayors Tuesday.
Darwin Lutterman was elected mayor of Tyler and Gene Kockelman was named mayor of Clarkfield.
Lutterman said he wanted to see a third candidate on the ballot and decided he should run for the position.
"It started last week in the middle of the week," said Lutterman. "It was Saturday night when I actually made up my mind. We got some fliers printed up and by Sunday afternoon we had fliers delivered to just about every house in town and we took it from there."
Lutterman received 241 write-in votes, Gary Manson received 204 votes and Dave Haroldson received 118 votes. There were also a additional 17 write-in votes. Lutterman is no stranger to working for the city of Tyler.
"I've worked for the city (as utilities superintendent) for 23 years and I pretty much know how it works," said Lutterman.
Lutterman said he was surprised by the amount of support he received from the Tyler community.
"That really blows me away that it turned out as well as it did," said Lutterman. "I talked to so many people as I was handing out those fliers that (also wanted another candidate). A lot of them said they would vote for me because there wasn't anyone else knocking on their door."
Kockelman was one of three candidates who expressed a willingness to serve as mayor if elected.
Kockelman received 161 votes, David Beirmaier received 115 votes and Jason McCoy received 24 votes.
Two incumbent Clarkfield city council members were re-elected with Bob Schlenner receiving 268 votes and Francis Staab receiving 234. A third candidate, Jessica Rapatt, received 191 votes. The top two vote-getters were elected for the two at-large positions.
"I did very little campaigning," said Kockelman. "We did go door to door. People know me, I've lived here long enough and I think people have confidence in me, I guess."
Kockelman said he appreciated the support from the community.
"I've lived here for 40 years, so I pretty much know about 80 percent of the people I talked to," said Kockelman. "I didn't get to hit all the doors, I had a group of people that supported what we did and away we went."
Kockelman served on the Clarkfield city council in the late 1980s and early 1990s. He said he is ready to work with the city again.
"I'm looking forward (to serving the city) and hopefully we can keep everything going good for Clarkfield and help it grow a little bit with some new industry," said Kockelman.
The Hendricks School Board will have three new members. Chester Frank received 341 votes, Phil Moen received 285 votes, Lisa Schmidt received 266 votes for the three 4-year seats.
Moen said he was happy to be elected to the board but said his job really begins now.
"It's kind of rewarding (to be elected) but now we have to look at what is ahead of us," said Moen. "What is our next step. We're going to have a number of new people on the board and we have to get up to speed on what is going on as far as education in Minnesota."
Moen said the school district needs to focus on ways of attracting students to Hendricks.
"Money is obviously a big problem," said Moen. "We need enough to sustain staff that is going to attract students and keep students here."
A number of candidates were elected to the Yellow Medicine East School Board Tuesday. Larry Lee of Granite Falls received 1,721 votes, Jane Hagert received 2,037 votes and Tim Opdahl received 2,588 votes. There were 1,161 write-in votes for four positions on the board.
A special election was also held with Grant Velde receiving 3,255 votes and 76 write-in votes. The school district was still reviewing write-in votes at 3:30 p.m. Wednesday.
While a number of new public officials will be joining boards and councils around the region, a handful of incumbents were re-elected. Yellow Medicine County Commissioners Gary Johnson of rural Clarkfield and Louis Sherlin of Canby both ran unopposed during the election. Johnson received 490 votes and Sherlin received 1,021 votes.
The election process in Lincoln County proved to be a smooth one. Deb Vierhuf deputy auditor for Lincoln County said the results were completed by about 11 p.m. Tuesday and the county was the second in the state to submit its results to the Secretary of State's office.
