The Hermiston City Council is more or less decided for the coming year.

Though vote totals will change as ballot counting continues from the May 17 primary, leading candidates expressed confidence and spoke of their feelings about their campaigns and their priorities moving forward.

All election results are preliminary and from the Oregon Secretary of State’s elections tracker.

Ward 1 (northwest Hermiston)

Soon after the polls had closed at 8 p.m., challenger Jackie Linton led incumbent Lori Davis. That margin maintained throughout the night and into the next day. The morning of May 18, Linton had 834 votes to Davis’ 747 (52.6% to 47.1%).

This is the closest race for Hermiston City Council, and Linton expressed gratitude to Councilor Davis, whom Linton said she would contact soon.

“I feel awesome. I’m very excited about it,” she said about the contest that put her against a three-term council member. “I’m happy that the race was respectful. It was about the issues we believe in; we were happy for each other for running.”

A substitute teacher and active community member, she said she wants to focus on housing, homelessness and police.

“The police department is short four officers, and that’s probably going to be my number one thing, trying to figure out, with the other city councilors, where to get the money to hire those four officers,” she said.

She stated that she is concerned about the focus on internet connectivity improvement, which she called a “luxury item.” Instead, she said, she wants to meet with local business leaders and see what they are most interested in.

Ward 2 (southwest Hermiston)

Incumbent Roy Barron led challenger Stan Stradley 924-603 votes (60.3% to 39.4%) for Ward 2. An Armand Larive Middle School teacher, Barron was on his way to fending off Stradley, a former executive director of the Umatilla County Housing Authority.

“I feel honored. I feel grateful,” Barron said. “I’m excited to see what the next four years have in store.”

He added there are projects he is happy to continue. Top priorities include items from the Hermiston 2040 committee, he said, including the oft-discussed aquatic center.

“We really want to make sure that the infrastructure projects that we have going on continue to move forward, that we’re financially stable and being fiscally prudent with our decisions,” he said.

He added he wanted to speak to Stradley and tell him of his respect for him.

“It’s not easy to put your name out there and run a campaign,” Barron said.

Ward 3 (northeast Hermiston)

The four ward positions were up for grabs in the election. Incumbent Jackie Myers, who has been on the council since 1994, was the only councilor who was running unopposed. As such, she said she was not altogether surprised by her lead the morning of May 18. She had 1,273 votes, 99% of the total vote count.

“I am very honored and excited to be elected to serve another four years,” Myers said. “I’ve always tried to be engaged and informed in my work for the citizens of Hermiston.”

She added she intends to continue her hard work to “help move Hermiston into the future in a progressive and thoughtful way.”

Ward 4 (southeast Hermiston)

Challenger David McCarthy, radio station sales manager, was leading the incumbent, Councilor Phillip Spicerkuhn. The vote count at that point was 1,046 to 462.

“I’m really surprised,” McCarthy said.

He added the surprise was not over winning, but the margin, which he attributed to his campaign.

“I did a few things (Spicerkuhn) didn’t do,” he said, such as advertise in the voters’ pamphlet, run radio ads and place signs.

As a city councilor, he said, he intends to make internet connectivity a priority. He added he has spoken with Umatilla County commissioners, who share his hope to improve internet service for residents, and he thinks they can get things done.

Also, he espoused on “low-cost, high-reward, low-risk” projects he said he feels the council also can accomplish.

“We do a lot of big things, and I’m happy about all of the big things that we are doing, like the city hall and the library remodeling and all of those things, and the things we’re doing at the park,” he said.

Still, he added, there are smaller projects that can make a big difference. He said he will be on the lookout for those items, helping people in his community.