Write-in campaign: Third person seeks mayor’s seat in city

Published 6:31 pm Saturday, September 5, 2015

A Washington woman, Kelly J. Hammonds, is conducting a write-in campaign as part of her effort to be elected the next mayor of Washington.

Hammonds is a member of the city’s Human Relations Council. Her three-year term expires June 30, 2018.

Hammonds filed the required statement of organization (candidate committee) to establish her write-in campaign with the Beaufort County Board of Elections on Friday, according to Kellie Harris Hopkins, county elections director.

Also seeking the mayor’s post is incumbent Mayor Mac Hodges, in his first two-year term, and Ronald Lundy.

In North Carolina, write-in candidates in partisan elections or judicial elections are required to submit nominating petitions signed by a specific number of qualified voters and a declaration of intent to run as a write-in candidate. However, those requirements do not apply in nonpartisan municipal elections. The elections for Washington mayor and City Council are nonpartisan. Such a write-in candidate must be a qualified voter and meet all requirements regarding candidates.

Oct. 2 is the beginning of absentee voting by mail for the Nov. 3 elections. Oct. 9 is the voter registration deadline for the Nov. 3 elections. Early voting for the Nov. 3 elections begins Oct. 22 and ends Oct. 31. Oct. 27 is the last day to request an absentee ballot.

 

About Mike Voss

Mike Voss is the contributing editor at the Washington Daily News. He has a daughter and four grandchildren. Except for nearly six years he worked at the Free Lance-Star in Fredericksburg, Va., in the early to mid-1990s, he has been at the Daily News since April 1986.
Journalism awards:
• Pulitzer Prize for Meritorious Public Service, 1990.
• Society of Professional Journalists: Sigma Delta Chi Award, Bronze Medallion.
• Associated Press Managing Editors’ Public Service Award.
• Investigative Reporters & Editors’ Award.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Public Service Award, 1989.
• North Carolina Press Association, Second Place, Investigative Reporting, 1990.
All those were for the articles he and Betty Gray wrote about the city’s contaminated water system in 1989-1990.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Investigative Reporting, 1991.
• North Carolina Press Association, Third Place, General News Reporting, 2005.
• North Carolina Press Association, Second Place, Lighter Columns, 2006.
Recently learned he will receive another award.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Lighter Columns, 2010.
4. Lectured at or served on seminar panels at journalism schools at UNC-Chapel Hill, University of Maryland, Columbia University, Mary Washington University and Francis Marion University.

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