Davis, CA – There are plenty of votes to be counted locally, but the Election Night tallies lend strong support for the notion that the status quo will hold in Davis – at least on this night.
In the only competitive council race, Linda Deos has a commanding lead over both Victor Lagunes and Dillan Horton.
Deos leads with 52 percent of the vote, followed by 27 percent for Lagunes and 21 percent for Dillan Horton.
Meanwhile the hotly contested and divisive Measure Q contest has 62 percent of the vote for Yes.
In the final Davis measure, the CFD for the Library – Measure T – holds a 72-28 advantage for Yes. That measure needs to hit the two-thirds threshold, and appears to be in position to do so. Measure Q only needed a majority.
Early Analysis
On a night across the country where the voters concertedly overturned the status quo, the same was not the case locally.
During the campaign, a fairly prominent local figure noted to me that a lot of voters thought Linda Deos had already been elected to something. She ran for the at-large City Council in 2018 and was basically the first runner up to Gloria Partida and Dan Carson. In 2020, she ran for County Supervisor against Jim Provenza and forced a run off before COVID changed the political environment and she faltered in the general election.
Interestingly, her showing so far looks remarkably similar to Will Arnold’s in 2020. Arnold finished with nearly half the vote and the two opponents finished in the 20s behind him. Deos actually has exceeded Arnold’s percentage so far, with again the two opponents being in the 20s.
While Deos will be reluctant to declare victory, according to the Elections Office data, 3454 ballots were counted but there are an additional 4100 or so registered voters. While an 769 vote lead doesn’t look insurmountable, it would take a near total reversal in the 3000 or so likely ballots to flip the result. That seems like a longshot.
Measure Q often overshadowed the council race. But it always seemed like an extreme longshot for the opposition to win. It doesn’t look like they will. At 62 percent of the vote, with at most another 19,000 votes to count (and more likely in the 15,000 vote range), it would take a 60 percent No surge (at least) to defeat the measure. That seems even more unlikely at this point.
I’ll have more to say on this in the coming days and weeks, but by comparison West Sacramento tax measure, which would also increase sales tax by a percentage point, appears poised to pass, but with a more modest 54-46 margin. That just demonstrates how much of a headwind the opposition to Q were facing.
Finally, Measure T didn’t get opposition, didn’t get a lot of attention but got 72 percent of the vote. That’s probably good enough to hold – although I didn’t do the exact math for this one.
It will be interesting to see where the city council spends their voter’s hard earned Measure Q money.