Park County voters continued the trend of overwhelmingly choosing Republicans over Democrats and other parties in Tuesday’s general election. County voters also split on two constitutional amendment questions, favoring one that would give all cities and counties more freedom to invest funds, while strongly opposing raising the retirement age for judges to 75 from 70. 

Contested state legislature races

State House District 50 Rep. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams, R-Cody, again faced and easily defeated a general election opponent, this time Libertarian Carrie Satterwhite of Ralston, after running unopposed in the Republican primary. Rodriguez-Williams took more than 82% of the vote to nearly 18% for Satterwhite. Rodriguez-Williams will start her third term in the Legislature in January. 

Rep. John Winter (R-Thermopolis), whose HD 28 covers an area from Hot Springs County to south of Cody, likewise ran unopposed in the primary but faced an opponent in the general, but he defeated Democrat Kimberly Bartlett with more than 81% of the vote to just under 18%.  

Constitutional amendments

Roughly 51% of Park County voters approved of a constitutional amendment that would give cities and counties the freedom to invest in the same manner as the state government, which has made a large amount of revenue over the years on its investments. 

Voters were strongly opposed, however, to an amendment that would raise the judge retirement age from 70-75, voting more than 63% against the measure. 

On both cases county voters followed the state trend, as statewide voters agreed with Constitutional Amendment A and turned down Amendment B. 

Park County officials

The three Republican county commissioner candidates who won the summer primary, including two incumbents and the soon-to-be retired county sheriff, held off a challenge by Libertarian Thomas Ehlers, Jr., the former county undersheriff, who won 10% of the vote. Dossie Overfield (28%) and Lloyd Thiel (26%) will start their second terms, and Scott Steward (32%) his first, in January. 

All other county elected positions were unopposed in the general election, including Cody Gortmaker for coroner, Bryan Skoric for county attorney, Darrell Steward for sheriff, Colleen Renner for clerk, Barbara Poley for treasurer, Pat Meyer for assessor and Debra Carroll for clerk of district court. 

Powell Fire District 

In the tightest race of the night for Powell Fire District Director #5, Heath Worstell (203 votes) defeated Earl Melton (199). Election staff said the result fell two votes shy of being close enough for an automatic recount, according to state statute 22-16-109. 

For Fire District Director #3, Gerald “Bear” May won with 192 votes, holding off Brian Beavers, who finished with 140, and Rob Feller (125). 

Jerry Faxon was the lone candidate running for Powell Fire District Director #1. 

Powell Clarks Fork Conservation District 

For the at-large trustee spot, incumbent Anthony Spiering defeated challenger Greg Mayton with nearly 72% of the vote to 28% for Mayton in a repeat of four years ago. 

Regan Smith ran unopposed to take the district’s rural trustee position and Colby Schaefer was the lone candidate for the urban trustee position. 

Statewide races

Republican candidates easily swept the three contested statewide races, with Harriet Hageman (76% in Park County) defeating three opponents to take the lone U.S. House seat, Gov. Mark Gordon (76%) winning a second term against two opponents and Megan Degenfelder (77%) defeating her Democratic opponent. In all three races the general proved easier than the primary for the candidates to win. 

Unopposed state legislature races

Many hotly contested races in the primary saw no general election opposition. After beating the incumbent and a former state senator in the Republican primary, Dan Laursen clinched Senate District 19 unopposed in the general. David Northrup, a former representative in HD 50, won a four-person race in the primary to be the Republican pick for his new district, HD 25, but also had no opposition en route to the general election win. 

Dalton Banks likewise was able to take it easy in securing HD 26 as he faced no opposition in the general after having to compete against three opponents in the primary. 

HD 24 Rep. Sandy Newsome likewise was able to coast to an uncontested win after winning a close Republican primary. 

Local unopposed races

In Powell City Council the three incumbents up for reelection were the only candidates for the three ward seats, thus Steven Lensegrav, Zane Logan and Timothy Sapp will all have new terms to start in January. 

Crown Hill Cemetery District in Powell initially had a race, but candidate Jerry Clark died prior to the election. Monte McClain, Clarence Anderson and John Karst took the three spots. 

In Bennett Butte Cemetery District in Clark, Sandy Specht, Jeannine Briggs and Tony Sansone fill the three open seats.

(Charles Larsen contributed to this report)