This November’s city election figures to be a quiet one, as there will be only two contested city council races — one apiece in Covington and Mansfield — in the entire county.
Qualifying for those seats ended this week, and the only two contested races will be:
• Covington City Council Post 1 east, between incumbent Chris Smith and Maurice Carter;
• Mansfield Post 4, between incumbent Lisa Dunn and Larry Cummins (who is actually also an incumbent, though he currently holds the Post 5 seat)
Newborn, Oxford and Porterdale will have no contested races. Newborn Town Clerk Lisa Rowe said Newborn’s three qualifying candidates will all be automatically elected without formal elections; Porterdale and Oxford are also not expected to hold elections.
Candidates who qualified, by city, are:
Covington
Post 1 East Ward – incumbent Chris Smith and Maurice Carter
Post 2 West Ward – incumbent Hawnethia Williams
Post 3 West Ward – incumbent Ocie Franklin
Porterdale
Post 3 – incumbent Tim Savage
Post 4 - incumbent Mike Harper
Post 5 – incumbent Lowell Chambers
Oxford
Post 4 – incumbent David Eady
Post 5 – incumbent Jim Windham
Post 6 – incumbent Terry Smith
Newborn
Mayor – incumbent Roger W. Sheridan
Post 3 – Ruth Sams
Post 4 – incumbent Martha Ellwanger
Sams will be new to the council. Post 3 had been held by Tom Krieger, but he is working more out of town and said he didn’t know if he could devote enough time to the position, Town Clerk Lisa Rowe said. Sams is retired.
Mansfield
Post 3 – Jeff Riley, business owner
(Lyra Cocchi is the incumbent.)
Post 4 – incumbent Lisa Dunn and Larry Cummins
Post 5 - Matt Clark
(Larry Cummins is the incumbent.)
Riley and Clark are both new to the council. Riley is a business owner in the design, printing and promotions field, and Clark is a software developer, according to their qualifying applications. Lyra Cocchi holds the post 3 seat, but she decided not to run again. Cummins holds the post 5 seat but apparently decided to run against Dunn instead of seeking his own seat. With the exception of Covington, which has east and west wards, residents of other cities can run for whatever seat they wish. In Covington, residents must run in the ward in which they live, but they can run for any of the three posts for that ward.
