Chapelboro reported today that Elizabeth Sharp was declared the winner of the final Chapel Hill Town Council seat after the certified count. Sharp leads Soll by six votes. Technically, because the lead is so close, Soll can ask for a recount. The results must also still be canvassed by the State Board of Elections on November 28th as multi-county (Durham and Orange.)
With the results now final, we look forward to seeing how Sharp settles into her role. In particular, Sharp is a small business owner in a town that is not a great place for small businesses (and in a far more complex way than Sharp and Adam Searing described when talking about Purple Bowl). We hope Sharp will lend her insights on this topic to help the town create a more vibrant ecosystems for entrepreneurs, which seems to align with her vision for a modern college town.
We’ll also be keeping an eye on how well Sharp plays with others. When Adam Searing was elected, he quickly earned a reputation for not putting in any work on the council and being unwilling to work with others. He was so convinced that his positions were right, and everyone else on Council was wrong, that he decided to run for mayor. As you know, he was beaten. Badly. Like Caleb Love beating Coach K twice badly. The sort of beatdown one does not recover from. You get the picture. Anyhoo, Council makes better decisions when people who disagree can come to the table and debate and compromise. We hope Sharp recognizes the lessons from this election – that the electorate is not interested in CHALT’s fever dream of a do-nothing government that romanticizes the past rather than focusing on the future – and leans into the opportunity to improve the town as it wrestles with growth and change. We can’t wait to see how her term unfolds.
Here are the precinct counts, after the provisional and supplemental absentee ballots were counted.
Stephen Whitlow contributed to this post. (Guess which parts).