The May 5 election results have been tallied, and the winners were Bill Blackburn (Mayor), Judy Eychner (Place 3), and Delayne Sigerman (Place 4, unopposed). Following the election, tradition calls for the defeated candidate to phone the winning candidate to offer congratulations, and to concede the election. Although the phone call really has no legal basis nor is it required, calling one’s opponent is considered customary and traditional, and serves to help unify the voters that were divided during the election. An exception to the concession call is typically made when the vote is too close to call, or there are any other abnormalities that call the election into question.
In this case, the winning candidates each garnered about 1,000 votes more than their opponents, so there really was no question about the margins. But the overwhelming victories weren’t enough to prompt either losing candidate to make that traditional phone call after this year’s election. Instead, the candidates have offered several quotes to two different newspapers so far. Here are their quotes:
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White: “I’ve done what the people asked me to do.”
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White: “I wish the campaign would have been based more on the issues… And, I was disappointed about the false narratives leveled against me.”
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Cooper: “The contentious nature of this election, to where people relied on half-truths and incited other people based on those half-truths to come vote. I had no clue a local election would be like that.”
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Cooper (when asked why he won’t call to concede): “I don’t know what they’re going to do [referring to the Attorney General]. It may be rude, or not protocol [not to concede], but I’ll sleep tonight. I’m proud of my campaign.”
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White: “There were no issues involved, for the most part, in his campaign. It was all personal attacks and character assassinations against me. For someone who claims to be a uniter, this is a bad first start. These wounds will take a long time to heal, if at all.”
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White: “I just think there were a lot of new voters who jumped in on the rhetoric, and it was kind of a ‘days of rage mentality’ to go down and join a movement, if you will … I think they were believing these false stories on Facebook.”
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White: “They had street walkers, and I couldn’t compete with them and those numbers because I was busy doing the job of mayor.”
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White: “We have traditionally been known as a very conservative stronghold in Kerr County. Maybe we’re not.”
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Cooper: “They talked about the City Council being divided, but in the next breath they’re saying the city is running the best it has in 30 years. If it ain’t broke, don’t break it.”
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Cooper: “The personal attacks on the mayor just ramped up and up and up.”
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Cooper: “Kerrville citizens will be shocked when they come to realize the person who they voted in as mayor is a liberal Democrat who no longer calls himself an evangelical Christian on Facebook.”
Hill Country Community Journal, May 9, 2018:
- Incumbent Mayor Bonnie White first said that she had no comment, then added, “Except I’m said it happened on a false narrative; and disappointed in the community for buying the lies about me. That’s all.”
The newly elected council members and mayor will be sworn in on May 15, meaning White remains Kerrville’s mayor until that date.
A meeting of the Comprehensive Plan committee was scheduled for Monday, May 7. Mayor Bonnie White was not in attendance, nor was Mr. Cooper, but all four councilpersons did attend (Voelkel, Baroody, Summerlin, and Ferguson). Although not at the city’s meeting, White was in attendance at the Kerr County Commissioners Court meeting that morning, even though no city-county business was on the agenda.
Tuesday night was the final City Council meeting on the calendar in which Bonnie White would be the presiding Mayor, since Blackburn doesn’t take the helm until May 15. White did not attend Tuesday night’s meeting. George Baroody, Mayor Pro Tem, presided.
EDIT on May 11: According to reports, Bonnie White did not attend the scheduled Mayor’s Youth Advisory Board meeting on Thursday. The meeting was held without her.
