Vittone, Shober Maintain Election Wins Following Absentee Count

and have held onto their leads and are the apparent winners of the Washington County District Attorney and county commissioner races after the count of absentee ballots.

The two-day count of about 1,300 absentee ballots from ended around noon on Thursday, and showed that although the margins of victory narrowed, Vittone and Shober were able to hold onto their election night victories.

With the results still unofficial until formally certified by the county election board, Republican candidate Gene Vittone ended with 50.09 percent of the vote and Democrat candidate Dave DiCarlo finished with 49.86 percent. Vittone’s total after the absentee voter count was 21,183 to DiCarlo’s 21,086—a difference of 97 votes.

In the county commissioner race, Democrat candidate Shober finished with 21.87 percent to Republican candidate Bill Northrop’s 21.32 percent. Totals showed Shober with 17,255 votes to Northrop’s 16,820.

“I’m very pleased and now we can get to work for the county,” said Shober, following the count. “I talked to Bill Northrop and anything he can do and I can do to help the county we will do. He ran a good race.”

Shober said the last two days have been taxing emotionally.

“Everybody was telling me that I was OK, but I’m a numbers person and I look for the facts. I wanted to see them come through before I believed it. You can’t make too many assumptions,” he said.

Vittone said he was relieved with the outcome.

“This was a hard fought campaign, he said. “My opponent worked hard and I worked hard. I’d just like to thank the voters of Washington County for their support and their trust in me.”

Vittone said the wait for the absentee count to be completed was agonizing.

“I’m just going to try and get some sleep now,” he said. “It’s been rough on the family waiting this out.”