LAKEPORT, Calif. – Based on preliminary results, Measure M, the fire parcel tax the Lakeport Fire Protection District put before voters in a special election, appears to be headed for victory.

The Lake County Registrar of Voters Office’s preliminary tally, issued on Tuesday night, showed Measure M receiving 1,415 yes votes, or 74.83 percent in favor, versus 476 no votes, accounting for 25.17 percent of the vote.

Those numbers indicate Measure M is on track to pass, as it must receive a supermajority of 66.7 percent.

Interim Deputy Registrar of Voters Marcy Harrison said the 1,891 ballots counted so far were what the elections office had received as of 5 p.m. Monday.

Harrison said about 100 more ballots came in on Tuesday, the final day of the special mail-in election. Those ballots were not included in the unofficial count.

Mail-in ballots postmarked by Tuesday will continue to be received until Friday, Harrison said.

In addition, retired Registrar Diane Fridley, who was on hand to observe the process, said anyone who failed to sign their mail-in ballot has eight days from the ballot deadline to get it reconciled and have it counted.

The ballots for the mail-in election went out at the start of April. In all, Harrison said 5,982 ballots were mailed to registered voters in the fire protection district’s boundaries.

The fire district board decided last fall to put the measure before voters following its approval of a worst case scenario budget that laid off three full-time firefighters, as Lake County News has reported.

“This is a very positive move for us,” Lakeport Fire Protection District Board Chair John Whitehead said on Tuesday, after viewing the preliminary results.

Whitehead was at the elections office on Tuesday evening to get the early vote count. He was joined by fellow longtime Board member Don Davidson; Alan Flora, one of the two new fire district board members and the city manager for Clearlake; and interim Chief Rick Bergem.

The last time the district had new revenue coming in through a parcel tax was in 1997, Whitehead said. Measure M will supersede that previous tax.

Whitehead said the funds won’t begin to come in until December, when the first installment of the 2019-20 property tax payments come due.

Measure M is forecast to bring in $1,206,000 in its first year. It allows for a consumer price index adjustment not to exceed 3 percent annually, so that by year five it is estimated to bring in revenue totaling more than $1.3 million.

In the meantime, the district is continuing to face budget challenges and has submitted a grant to the Federal Emergency Management Agency seeking funds to rehire the firefighters it laid off.

First run for new voting equipment

The Measure M special election presented the first opportunity for the county to use its new voting software and equipment, purchased in March from Hart InterCivic.

Hart InterCivic staff were on site to assist the county elections office with the vote count.

Harrison said the new equipment is “pretty simple” and user friendly.

Among the ballot count’s observers on Tuesday evening was former Deputy Registrar Maria Valadez, who worked with Fridley for more than two decades, served briefly as interim registrar after Fridley’s December retirement and then left the county of Lake in February to accept a job as assistant county clerk-recorder-registrar of voters for Mendocino County.

Mendocino is now looking at purchasing new elections equipment, a situation common across California after Secretary of State Alex Padilla decertified legacy voting systems in February, setting an August deadline to put new systems in place.

Also present Tuesday night was County Administrative Officer Carol Huchingson, who the Board of Supervisors appointed interim registrar in February in the wake of Valadez’s departure.

The official canvass is 30 days long and begins on Thursday, Harrison said. By the end of the official canvass, the election results will be certified and become final.

As part of certifying the election results, the Registrar of Voters Office will conduct a public manual tally of a minimum of 1 percent of randomly selected precincts for the election beginning at 9 a.m. Thursday, May 16. The public is welcome to observe.

Correction: The article has been corrected to show that the official canvass starts Thursday, not Friday.

Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.