Two open Ceres City Council seats have challengers but the filing deadline for one of those seats ends today.
The candidate filing period ended Friday but in instances where the incumbent did not file to run, the candidate filing period for that office is extended to today. That is the case for the District 1 council seat where incumbent James Casey is not running again. The seat already has two declared candidates – Gary M. Condit and Dorie Perez, both members of the Ceres Planning Commission.
As of Wednesday morning, nobody else had picked up nomination papers to run.
The die is cast for candidates in the Ceres City Council District 2 race, where incumbent Councilwoman Rosalinda Vierra is being challenged by Jorge Guerrero, president of Ceres Youth Baseball; and Ceres resident Galen Guzman.
All four incumbents on the Ceres Unified School District Board of Trustees facing election have filed to run and have no opponents as of Tuesday. CUSD Trustees Cynthia Ruiz (Area 2), Valli Wigt (Area 3), Lourdes Perez (Area 5) and Dave McConnell (Area 6) will be appointed since they have no opposition.
The filing deadline is also extended today for Hughson Unified School District (Area 2), the Keyes Community Services District, the Monterey Park Tract Community Services District and the Stanislaus County Board of Education in Area 5.
In the city of Hughson, three two challengers are emerging to take on Mayor George Carr. The two-year mayoral term has piqued the interest of Geoff Powers who has filed his papers and Sam Rush who picked up papers on July 29.
The Hughson City Council seats of Randy Crooker and Julie Ann Strain are up for grabs. Strain’s nomination papers are verified as well as the papers of Brian Evans. Ranjit Singh also picked up papers but had not returned them as of Monday morning.
Voters in the Hughson Unified School District will be deciding who to elect to the Board of Trustees. The seats occupied by Alida Garcia (Area 2), Randall “Randy” Heckman (Area 4) and Mark Foss (Area 5) are all up for grabs. As of Tuesday, only Heckman and Foss emerged as a candidate in Trustee Area 4. No one has picked up papers for Area 2.
Three seats on the Keyes Union School District Board of Trustees are to be filled by the incumbents since they attracted no opponents. They are Jimmy Emmons, Sr. (Area 2), Jeff Reed (Area 3) and Wesley A. Greene (Area 5).
The Keyes Community Service District board will be short two members because there is one seat vacant and nobody has filed to run for a seat occupied by director Shannon Williams. Johnathon Parker is the lone candidate in a field of three open seats.
Apathy also seems to be high in the Monterey Park Tract Community Service District where there is no interest in the three seats on the Board occupied by directors Jerry Tyrone McKinney, Dean Riddle and Bettie J. Yelder.
The same holds true in the Riverdale Park Tract Community Service District in south Modesto. Four seats are open with no candidates.
Two seats are open for the Ceres Fire Protection District but there are no candidates due to the fact that the district is in the works to be absorbed into the Stanislaus Consolidated Fire District.
Hughson Fire Protection District directors Gus Villarreal and Miguel have both filed to run for another seat with no opposition.
Two board director seats in the Westport Fire Protection District are expiring this year. They are occupied by Ross Lee and Ed Amador who are unopposed.
Turlock Irrigation District Division 2 Director David Yonan is running unopposed as are TID directors Joe Alamo (Division 3) and Ron Macedo (Division 5). Division 2 encompasses Ceres.
Three seats are open on the Stanislaus County Board of Education. Kim Rose in Area 1 and Alice Pollard in Area 2 are unopposed. Area 5 incumbent Chinyere Nnodim Jack did not file and thus the deadline for Area 5 is extended to today.
Candidates have emerged for the three seats on the Yosemite Community College District Board of Trustees expiring at year’s end. Trustee Don Davis (Area 1) is being opposed by William Andrew Dunn who is an educational consultant. Trustee Nancy Hinton (Area 2) did not file but Debra Hendricks, a retired school superintendent, has filed her candidacy as has Davis Rico, a veterans’ services aide. Trustee Jenny Nicolau (Area 4) has filed and has an opponent in teacher Ryan Segoviano.
Ceres voters will be asked if they wish to implement a one-cent sales tax to bolster city coffers. Measure P is titled the “Ceres 911 Emergency Response, Community Safety, Essential Services Measure.” If passed it would generate an estimated $9.4 million annually for the city but also make Ceres’ sales tax rate the highest in Stanislaus County at 9.375 percent.
In the 4th state Senate race, voters will be deciding between Jaron Brandon, a Democrat, and Alexandra Duarte, a Republican. Incumbent State Senator Marie Alvarado-Gil lost the primary election by falling in third place.
Voters in the 13th Congressional District have a choice between Adam Gray (D) and Kevin Lincoln (R).
