UPDATE: As of the March 12 ballot count, the unofficial results indicate that most of Redondo Beach’s incumbents (Mayor Bill Brand, Councilmembers Nils Nehrenheim and Todd Loewenstein, and City Attorney Michael Webb) have been reelected — save for one. District 4 City Council challenger Zein Obagi has defeated incumbent John Gran by 33 votes.
Gran publicly congratulated Obagi via Facebook: “While we fought a tough campaign, I'm confident he will listen to our residents, and do his best for District 4, North Redondo Beach, and our fine city.”
Obagi, in return, publicly thanked Gran for four years of professionalism and service on the City Council.
in the race for three open seats on the Redondo Beach Board of Education, Dan Elder, Rachel Silverman Nemeth, and Rolf Strutzenberg maintained their election night leads.
Ultimately, 27.63% of Redondo’s registered voters participated in the 2021 election. That figure is similar to the city’s standard turnout for elections, but quite a bit lower than the 85% that participated in the 2020 Presidential election.
The election results will be certified at the March 16 Redondo Beach City Council meeting.
Original Story below.
REDONDO BEACH, Calif. — The first round of ballots has been counted in this year’s Redondo Beach municipal election, and preliminary results indicate that the city’s incumbents are going to stay in their seats for one more term — though results are subject to a flood of ballots that came in too late to be part of the first count.
The results also show that the city’s electorate wasn’t turning out early. As of 11:11 p.m. on March 2, little more than 5,100 voters — about 10.19% of the city’s registered voters — participated in the city’s election. But according to Redondo’s City Clerk, Eleanor Manzano, at least 7,600 ballots remain to be counted.
People just weren’t voting early, Manzano said — but by election day, ballots came in droves. More than 1,600 ballots were picked up on election day at the city’s North Branch Library alone.
The incumbents — Mayor Bill Brand, City Council members Nils Nehrenheim, Todd Loewenstein, John Gran, and City Attorney Michael Webb — all appear to have prevailed based on early returns. The closest race, between Gran and challenger Zein Obagi, has a 75 vote margin in Gran’s favor.
The city’s school board race, where eight candidates seek to win three open seats, also remains tight. Currently, Rachel Nemeth, Dan Elder, and Rolf Strutzenberg are the top vote-getters. Three more candidates are about 300 votes behind Elder and Strutzenberg.
Whether or not late votes will turn the tide is a huge question. Over the past decade, an average of fewer than one-third of Redondo’s registered voters have cast ballots in each of the city’s municipal elections. Redondo’s elections are held off-cycle, during years when statewide elections don’t take place.
This year, only 5,134 of the city’s 50,398 registered voters cast ballots in time to be counted on March 2.
During the Nov. 2020 election, 85% of Redondo’s voters cast ballots; since 2012, Redondo has not seen fewer than 40% voter turnout in general election years.
Now, that’s a lot of numbers and percentages to throw out, but it boils down to the fact that voters have shown up for general elections more than municipal elections.
In 2014, the California Legislature attempted to close the divide by passing SB 415, which compelled all municipal bodies to hold their elections alongside state-wide elections.
Redondo Beach’s window to consolidate its elections closed in 2017 when Brand and the members of the City Council couldn’t find agreement. One proposed plan was vetoed by Brand, and subsequent last-minute meetings failed for lack of quorum. Redondo then sued the state, arguing that the California Constitution gave charter cities like Redondo the power to control their electoral destinies. The courts agreed, and Redondo was free to run this election on its own.
The next ballot count update will come on March 12. If necessary, another ballot count update will take place on March 17.