{"id":6430,"date":"2010-11-11T18:33:40","date_gmt":"2010-11-11T23:33:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.howderfamily.com\/blog\/?p=6430"},"modified":"2022-01-29T08:47:51","modified_gmt":"2022-01-29T13:47:51","slug":"benton-county-election-result","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.howderfamily.com\/blog\/benton-county-election-result\/","title":{"rendered":"The Returns Are In.  Maybe."},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>I&#8217;ve been meaning to fill you in on the results of <a href=\"\/blog\/?p=6070\">a referendum I mentioned<\/a> a few weeks ago. Approval would have moved the Benton Co., Washington county seat to from Prosser to Kennewick.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/96225726@N08\/8872543536\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/3787\/8872543536_7c4358028d_b.jpg\" alt=\"Columbia Park, Kennewick \/ Richland, Washington. Photo by howderfamily.com; (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)\"\/><\/a><figcaption>Columbia Park in Benton County, Washington<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>The vote happened more than a week ago. Only now do I feel there&#8217;s enough certainty to announce a probable result. It would be an understatement to say that there have been some interesting twists along the way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"the-voters-speak\">The Voters Speak<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>I guess it was Thursday after the election when I remembered to check this so I could report back to you. Fortunately the diligent visitors on Twelve Mile Circle have my back. A comment was already waiting in the moderation queue from faithful reader Benjamin Lukoff. He&#8217;d already done all the dirty work for me and even gave me some info from the Seattle Times. I was able to use that to find <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">the source article<\/span> [<em>link no longer works<\/em>] in the Tri-City Herald. The headline gave it away: &#8220;Benton Co. seat move fails to gain supermajority.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>&#8220;The measure requires at least 60 percent &#8212; a supermajority &#8212; to succeed, and the unofficial count was 56 percent supporting the move, with 44 percent opposed&#8230; Fred Staples, the retired county superior court judge who gathered 23,600 petition signatures to force the county seat question to the ballot, was more than disappointed&#8230; Staples, who is 77, said he has no plans to bring the issue back.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>The campaign got heated and ugly with accusations flying back-and-forth in the final days. However the voters had their final say and they&#8217;d made a decision.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"or-did-they\">Or Did They?!?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>I&#8217;d put the topic aside and prepared to post an update the next evening. Meanwhile everything took an unexpected turn. A new comment waited in the queue from a supporter of the initiative. She citing a new article from the Tri-City Herald, &#8220;County seat relocation closer to approval&#8221;. The percentage of voters approving the referendum had inched upwards as the county auditor tallied additional ballots. Again, I put my keyboard aside until I could get a better understanding of the true results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then I heard from an opponent of the move, citing the mathematical improbability of the initiative passing even with the revised ballot count. The needle had moved slightly closer to 60% but the headline was misleading. She included a link to a pro-Prosser website, <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">BentonCoSeat.info<\/span> [<em>link no longer works<\/em>] as a source of further information. Certainly it was written with a specific point of view but it did contain some interesting video including an election report from a local news station.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><object width=\"320\" height=\"264\"><param name=\"movie\" type=\"application\/x-shockwave-flash\" value=\"http:\/\/www.keprtv.com\/v\/?i=106612279\"><param name=\"allowScriptAccess\" value=\"always\"><param name=\"wmode\" value=\"transparent\"><\/object>I decided to wait a few days to let the dust settle. Now a November 10, 2010 article notes, &#8220;<em>Tuesday&#8217;s count showed 55.5 percent support for the measure to move the county seat from Prosser to Kennewick, with 44.5 percent opposed&#8230; The county&#8217;s election results are scheduled to be certified by the canvassing board Nov. 23.<\/em>&#8221; With that, I think it&#8217;s fairly safe to assume &#8212; more than a week after the vote &#8212; that the party&#8217;s finally over and the county seat won&#8217;t be moving from Prosser to Kennewick during our lifetimes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Honestly, I have absolutely no stake in either outcome. I am but a simple observer of strange geography. This one took me for a loop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[<strong><em>Sept. 2020 UPDATE: the county seat <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Benton_County,_Washington\">remains in Prosser<\/a><\/em><\/strong>].<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;ve been meaning to fill you in on the results of a referendum I mentioned a few weeks ago. Approval would have moved the Benton Co., Washington county seat to from Prosser to Kennewick. The vote happened more than a week ago. Only now do I feel there&#8217;s enough certainty to announce a probable result. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,501,97,22],"tags":[2511,2513,2510,2509,16],"class_list":["post-6430","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cities","category-event","category-government","category-counties","tag-benton-co","tag-election","tag-kennewick","tag-prosser","tag-washington"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>The Returns Are In. Maybe. - Twelve Mile Circle - An Appreciation of Unusual Places<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Did the Benton County, Washington seat of government move from Prosser to Kennewick? The vote is in but unclear.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.howderfamily.com\/blog\/benton-county-election-result\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Returns Are In. Maybe. - Twelve Mile Circle - An Appreciation of Unusual Places\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Did the Benton County, Washington seat of government move from Prosser to Kennewick? 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