Theresa Riel, a recently retired Pima Community College faculty member, is taking a big early lead over incumbent Demion Clinco for the District 2 seat up for grabs on Pima Community College’s five-member Governing Board.
With most early ballots and 95% of precinct votes counted as of Wednesday morning, Riel has 62% of the vote and Clinco has 38%. Pima County election officials are still waiting to report results from provisional ballot and lingering early ballots.
Early Tuesday evening, Riel was settling in at a lively election night watch party at Brother John’s Beer, Bourbon and BBQ restaurant, which was hosted by her supporters at the Pima Community College Education Association, an affiliate of the Arizona Education Association that represents some full-time faculty at the college.
PCC Governing Board candidate Theresa Riel reflects on race against incumbent Demion Clinco.
“I’m feeling I’m going to win,” Riel said. “It might be my naivete being new to politics, but all the people I talk to — there’s just limitless support.”
The numbers so far have validated her intuition.
Although Clinco had not officially conceded Wednesday morning, he told the Arizona Daily Star over email Wednesday morning " it doesn’t look like we will win the race."
Even still, Clinco said "I personally remain committed to serving our community and wish the new board members the greatest success in leading the college into this new chapter."
In the race for the college’s District 4 seat, which is vacant after Meredith Hay did not seek re-election this year, Greg Taylor was leading his opponent Nick Pierson by 8% as of early Wednesday morning. Taylor has 54% of those votes and Pierson 46%.
Pima County election officials have not yet tallied all of the ballots it has received and will not have final election results until later Wednesday. This story will be updated.
