A political house-cleaning by late write-in campaigns resulted
in all three Lester Prairie incumbents being removed from office in Tuesday’s
election.
Only incumbents Mayor Ed Mlynar and Council members Stan
Ehrke and Larry Peterson were on the ballot, but all three lost by large
margins to write-in candidates.
Former mayor Eric Angvall was elected to that position
with 447 votes to 193 for Mlynar.
In the council race, Larry Hoof (441 votes) and Roland
Bruckschen (418) were elected over Ehrke (192) and Peterson (114). Write-in
candidate Mark Rath received 23 votes.
Lester Prairie boasted the highest voter turnout in McLeod
County with 671 votes being cast out of 674 registered voters.
With longtime Mayor Don Guggemos stepping down, Floyd Sneer
was elected to the mayor’s position with 480 votes to 394 for Aaron Wiemiller.
In the five-way council race for two seats, incumbent Gary
Lenz was elected with 493 votes as was former council member Tom Wiemiller
with 469. Following them were Jeff Albers with 383, incumbent Bonnie Quast
with 359, and Lindy Rubel with 57.
Winsted had 974 votes cast with 1,053 people registered
as voters. There were 172 new registrants on election day.
Wayne Vinkemeier will replace his supervisor, Duane Kopesky,
as McLeod County Sheriff in 1999. Kopesky announced his retirement earlier
in the year.
Vinkemeier gathered 10,186 votes county-wide to 4,658 for
Glencoe police officer Scott Stumpf.
The other contested county race was for treasurer, with
incumbent Linda Radtke defeating Mark Erickson 11,444 to 3,204.
County officials being re-elected while running unopposed
were Attorney Michael Junge, Auditor Cindy Schultz, and Recorder Carmen
Ostlie Mulder.
Fourth District County Commissioner Sheldon Nies was re-elected
over challenger Robert Anderson by a margin of 1,617 to 1,267.
Second District Commissioner Melvin Dose, running unopposed,
retained his seat on the county board.
McLeod County reported an 88 percent voter turnout with
17,592 registered voters and 15,448 votes cast.
District 20B Representative Tony Kielkucki, rural Lester
Prairie, was returned to office, fending off a challenge from Mari Pokornowski
of Cokato. It will be Kielkucki’s second term.
Kielkucki received 8,618 votes (56 percent) to 6,723 for
Pokornowski.
Jesse Ventura’s path to the governor’s seat had strong
support in McLeod County.
Ventura carried all 28 precincts in McLeod County, some
by huge margins.
In all, Ventura took 53 percent of the county vote to 31
percent for Norm Coleman and 16 percent for Skip Humphrey.
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