Democratic candidate Victoria Lightcap is the unofficial loser for the 12th District seat in the Onondaga County Legislature on Tuesday. She lost to Republican Bob DeMore, but Lightcap called the race a good sign for her.
“I think that he was saying that he was going to beat me by two to one and I think that this shows a voice for change.” [Victoria Lightcap]
With 100 percent of the polling places reporting, according to News10Now, the unofficial tallies showed Democratic candidate Lightcap with 3,073 votes or 44 percent; Republican candidate Demore winning with 3,746 votes or 53 percent. Trailing far behind was Conservative candidate Lee Stemmer with 224 votes or 3 percent of the ballots.
At a committee member’s home earlier on Tuesday, Lightcap and her campaign committee were busy making calls—trying to get voters to the polls.
“I’m a registered Democrat in the town of Pompey supporting Victoria Lightcap in the county legislature seat that Dale Sweetland has vacated and hoping that if you haven’t voted — if you’ve already voted I apologize for the phone call — but we now have a chance to choose who represents us in this district which hasn’t happened for some 16 years.” [committee member]
Lightcap has never held political office. She has worked as a trial lawyer for 20 years and been a coach of her daughter’s cheer team and organizer of a chess club. Now that her kids are grown—Lightcap says she was excited to have the chance to campaign for office.
“It’s been 24/7 making phone calls, getting out the vote, being visible on the street corners, putting up lawn signs, getting out there and just meeting the people and encouraging them to get out and vote.” [Victoria Lightcap]
During her campaign, she talked about helping her district reach its full potential and making Onondaga County a place people want to stay.
“We’ve got to really make a strong effort to incorporate some of these universities, what I call the eds and the meds — the education institutions and the medical institutions — and we need to look to them to make a better economic base for our community.” [Victoria Lightcap]
At the polls Tuesday, her message had made an impression on some voters — especially Lightcap’s proposals for public forums or firehouse chats. Dennis Visco, a computer security engineer, says Lightcap has reached out to the community throughout her campaign.
“She took the time to go around to every house in our community, knocked on the door, talked to people so that was something I thought was admirable of a politician.” [Dennis Visco]
For over a deacade, the 12th District seat has been held by Republican Dale Sweetland— and the unofficial vote at News10now shows that voters want to keep the district Republican. Richard Carino says after reading up on both candidates, he supported DeMore in the election.
“I felt the person I voted for had more relative experience.”[Richard Carino]
A final reminder—In the 12th District County Legislature race the winner is Republican Bob DeMore, with Democrat Victoria Lightcap coming in second and Conservative candidate Lee Stemmer a distant third.
For Democracywise, I’m Amy Aaronson.
(Amy Aaronson is a junior broadcast journalism student.)
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