State Sen. Stan Bingham will return for his seventh term in the N.C. General Assembly after defeating two other Republicans on Tuesday, according to unofficial results.
Johnnie McLean, deputy director of the N.C. State Board of Elections in Raleigh, said a recount — if the unofficial results hold up — would not be necessary in the N.C. District 33 race. She declared Bingham, according to the unofficial results, the winner of the seat.
With no Democrats or Libertarians filing, the winner — once it becomes official — will take the N.C. Senate District 33 seat.
"That's great news," Bingham said Wednesday morning. "I'm very happy we won. I had lot of people helping me. I am just very pleased because so many people came to my aid. We didn't do any work at the polls. I had people call wanting to do that, but I just hated to impose on them for them to spend hours at the polls because it was enough putting up signs and doing other things. It was just real rewarding and pleasing that I had so many friends and supporters around the county."
Bingham defeated Eddie Gallimore, the former vice chairman of the Davidson County Republican Party, with 40.42 percent (9,089 votes), according to unofficial results. Gallimore garnered 38.23 percent (8,597 votes), and Sam Watford, chairman of the Davidson County Board of Commissioners, got 21.35 percent (4,802 votes).
McLean said a recount could be granted if Bingham won by 225 votes or less. Bingham ended up winning by 492 votes.
In Davidson County, Bingham took 39.41 percent (8,034 votes), Gallimore captured 39.16 percent (7,982 votes), and Watford received 21.43 percent (4,368 votes). In Montgomery County, Bingham received 50.14 percent (1,055 votes), Gallimore got 29.23 percent (615 votes), and Watford recorded 20.63 percent (434 votes).
Ruth Huneycutt, director of the Davidson County Board of Elections, said her board will conduct a canvass Tuesday. McLean said the N.C. Board of Elections will do its canvass during the week of May 21. Those canvasses have to be completed before Bingham is declared the official winner.
Huneycutt said Bingham needed at least 40 percent to take the seat and avoid a runoff. If he had less than 40 percent, Gallimore could request a runoff that would be held July 17.
Provisional and curbside votes still need to be counted, and Huneycutt didn't expect to have totals of how many votes those accounted for until Thursday evening.
"Everything is unofficial at this time," she said. "There's still ballots here in Davidson County, and I'm sure Montgomery County is in the same situation. … It appears there will be no runoff (between Bingham and Gallimore)."
Bingham did not find out that he was the top vote-getter until late Tuesday night.
Huneycutt attributed the late returns to poll workers at the Silver Hill and Liberty precincts.
"There was no major problem," she said. "It was just the fact that we had new precinct officials at some of those precincts. They've got to learn how to operate those machines."
Meanwhile, some of the long lines at various polling locations across Davidson County were due to a new procedure implemented by the Davidson County Board of Elections, Huneycutt said.
Instead of manually checking in voters with a sheet paper at polling locations, Davidson County BOE officials utilized one laptop at each location to check in voters.
"It's a new process for our precinct officials," Huneycutt said. "So anytime you instigate a new process, it's going to take a couple of times to get them indoctrinated in it."
A large turnout apparently due to Amendment One, which will amend the state constitution to define marriage as between one man and one woman after receiving voters' approval, and a new process didn't help matters at the polls as well.
"We went from manually looking up people's votes to laptops," Huneycutt said. "Voter turnout was much greater than we had anticipated, so we put one laptop (per polling location) and trained those precinct officials getting ready for November. We used laptops and technology. Voter turnout increased greater than we anticipated so we undershot our estimates.
"I predicted 25 percent maximum, so the precincts that we did not hit the 25 percent, we were all right. The precincts that went over, right now, we ended up with over 33 percent voter turnout, so an 8 percent (projected increase) of voter turnout makes a difference."
Huneycutt noted there are 43 precincts in Davidson County.
"One precinct is going to be late coming in no matter what you do, so it's hard to train and know there is going to be a problem in Lexington because next time it may be in Thomasville," she said. "We will do more thorough training with the ones we had a problem with this time and then it will be somewhere else. You've got to realize that these precinct officials only hold at the very most three elections a year. Some of these people (Tuesday) had not held an election since November of 2010. It's a great responsibility for those precinct people on Election Day because they don't deal with it like I do every day."
The Wallburg, Arcadia and Silver Hill precincts returns were the last to reach the Davidson County Board of Elections in Lexington on Tuesday night.
"It takes about 30 minutes to close down," Huneycutt said. "… You've got a good hour's work after the last person has voted. … You've got a good hour getting machines shut down. … You've got to realize Wallburg, for instance, is 40 minutes away from (the Davidson County Board of Elections), so you've got 40 minutes of driving time."
Darrick Ignasiak can be reached at 249-3981, ext. 217, or at darrick.ignasiak@the-dispatch.com.