Three Alachua County Towns Hold Municipal Elections; Incumbents Hold Firm in Newberry, Newcomer Wins in Alachua

ALACHUA – Results from Tuesday's municipal elections across Alachua County showed a mix of incumbent strength and fresh faces, with voters in Newberry, Alachua, and Archer weighing in on the direction of their local governments.

Newberry

In what proved to be the most hard-fought contests of the night, Newberry voters returned all three incumbents to office in races that drew significant attention across the small city.

Richard “Ricky” Coleman held his Group 1 seat comfortably, defeating challenger Brandy Oldman by a margin of 602 to 234, capturing 72% of the vote. In the Group 2 race, incumbent Mark L. Clark turned back David "Wally" Wallace 531 to 296, earning 64% of the vote.

The Group 3 contest was the closest of the three, with incumbent Monty Farnsworth fending off two challengers. Farnsworth finished with 399 votes, good for 47%, while Naim Joseph Erched came in second with 331 votes and JD Mercado finished third with 111 votes. Because no candidate in the three-way race cleared the 50% threshold, Farnsworth won by plurality under the city's rules.

Alachua

In the City of Alachua, political newcomer Jackson Youmas navigated a three-way race to win a city commission seat, but just barely avoided a runoff.

Youmas, a Democrat backed by the Alachua County Democratic Executive Committee, which devoted considerable organizational resources to his campaign, finished with 833 votes winning 51.9% of the 1,606 ballots cast. That left him just 29 votes above the threshold required to avoid a runoff. His opponents, both Republicans running in the formally non-partisan contest, were incumbent Dayna Williams, who received 463 votes (28.8%), and Bill Menadier, who collected 310 votes (19.3%).

The narrow margin underscored how close the race came to extending into a runoff. Had just 30 votes gone the other way — shifting from Youmas to Williams or Menadier, Youmas would have fallen below the majority threshold and a runoff between the top two finishers would have been required.

Archer

In the City of Archer, Jennifer Rossi defeated incumbent Kathy Penny, 70 votes to 61, in a contest that saw Rossi capture nearly 53.5% of the 131 ballots cast. The margin was narrow but decisive, ending Penny's tenure on the city commission.

In a second Archer race, William Lewandowski ran unopposed and was elected without opposition to his commission seat.

Results are unofficial pending certification.

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