Brennan, Black atop school board field, with thousands of ballots left to review

With tens of thousands of ballots left to review, the race for three seats on the Frederick County Board of Education is still undecided.

Jaime Kiersten Brennan and Colt Morningstar Black lead the field with 49,248 and 48,061 votes, respectively, based on unofficial election results from early voting, some mail-in ballots and all 66 Election Day precincts in Frederick County reporting.

Next are three candidates on the "apple ballot" — those endorsed by Frederick County Public Schools employee unions — in third, fourth, and fifth.

Janie Monier leads the apple ballot with 43,110 votes, followed by Josh Bokee with 41,883 votes and Chad King Wilson Sr. with 38,185 votes.

Veronica D. Lowe is in sixth place with 33,865 votes.

The Frederick County Board of Elections sent out 41,669 mail-in ballots across the county. Anthony Gutierrez, election deputy director for the board of elections, said there are approximately 20,000 more mail-in ballots to canvass as of Wednesday.

Canvassing refers to examining and counting mail-in and provisional ballots.

He said more mail-in ballots can still arrive at the office and be counted if they were postmarked by Nov. 5, but the ballots must be at the board's office by 10 a.m. on Nov. 15.

Heather Fletcher registered to be a write-in candidate for the school board and campaigned with Brennan and Black. Maryland State Board of Elections data shows 21,315 votes for write-in candidates, but does not say yet who received them.

Gutierrez said on Wednesday that processing write-in tallies for specific candidates happens later in the election process.

He said he did not have an exact date when the write-in votes will be listed for a specific candidate, but all votes will be counted by the Nov. 15 deadline to certify the election results.

In separate interviews on Wednesday, Brennan and Black both said they are "cautiously optimistic" about the results from Tuesday night.

Brennan said she picked up campaign signs and went home after polls closed on Tuesday. She said she was determined to avoid all media coverage about the school board race.

"I wish that all ballots had to be in by the election deadline and counted at the same rate as the other ones," Brennan said.

Black said the results from Tuesday night are encouraging, and it is a relief to have made it through Election Day.

"It really shows, in the numbers, the involvement of the county Republican Party taking an interest in the school board race and actually working to get our base out," he said. "I think that really helped in our numbers."

Bokee said in an interview on Wednesday that he is grateful for the support and for the experience of meeting so many different people from across the county.

"Right now, we'll continue to wait for all of the votes to be counted," he said.

In an interview on Wednesday, Lowe said she is proud of the campaign she ran and is grateful to her friends, family and those who voted for her.

She added that she is saddened by the prospect of no minority representation with voting power on the school board if she or Wilson are not elected, referring to the fact that she and Wilson are Black.

"Representation matters," Lowe said. "Our children need to be able to see people who look like them in the classroom and in leadership positions."

Wilson and Monier could not be reached for comment by phone on Wednesday.