Grady Sexton, Keach Win Concord's Two At-Large Seats

By Ryan O'Connor and Tony Schinella

Buoyed by incumbency and a late boost from the city’s firefighters’ union, Ward Councilors Amanda Grady Sexton and Fred Keach successfully secured the two four-year seats on the Concord City Council this year by solid margins.

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Grady Sexton, who spent the most money in 2013 and ran a competent campaign, including at least one mailer to female voters and a slew of endorsements, received nearly 2,767 votes. Keach received 2,290, according to unofficial returns.

"I think that I've been very fortunate to have so many hardworking volunteers and friends who have been supportive during this race," said Grady Sexton. "I took a risk running at-large, but I'm extremely thankful for the results and excited moving forward."

Keach said he felt comfortable, based on the reported results, confirming victory.

Though disappointed with some of the behavior of some of his competitors during the campaign process, Keach said he was happy to hear voters supported the candidates with the most well-rounded knowledge of local issues.

"I'm glad there was a large field of candidates. I mean, anytime there is strong participation, that's obviously a good thing," he said. "A lot of candidates were really one-issue candidates, and based on what I heard during the debates, I found them to be passionate on a specific issue, but lacking knowledge on all the other issues.”

Keach added that it was, “a good race ... I felt there were times that other candidates brought in personal issues that were not appropriate or helpful to the conversations, but obviously I'm pleased with the final result."

Clattenburg, who received 895 votes, and came in third, said despite not winning, she was impressed with the results, adding that things she said during the campaign seemed to clearly resonate with voters. She added that about a fourth of the voters gave her one of their two votes. 

“I’ll take it,” she said, clearly pleased with results, adding that she would definitely consider running again in 2015.

“I did it very last minute, the first portion of my campaign,” she said. “I was unprepared … I didn’t realize how overwhelming it would be … but after that, it all came together. But, yeah, absolutely, I will run again.”

Scott Welch, who lost his third bid for a council seat, receiving 583 votes, echoed Keach's sentiment on the pet issues, though he offered a bit of different perspective.

"I think the biggest point of the race is a lot of issues that got discussed probably wouldn't have had other people not thrown their hats into the ring," said Welch. "I think one of the important issues ... is obviously the Bearcat vote. I felt it interesting that only four of the councilmen voted with the people on the issue. It was a clear to me, based on a lot of the voters I talked to during the campaign, was this was something the residents of Concord did not want.”

While he was disappointed with the results, Welch said he will not run a forth race

"When turnout is this low, it's inevitable that incumbents are generally going to hang onto their seats," he said. "Approximately 15 percent of the people of the city of Concord made this decision, and their decision was to move forward with the incumbents."

Timothy Willis, another at-large council candidate who was unsuccessful, coming in fifth with 261 votes, shared some of Welch's frustration, specifically pointing to a lack of overall informative sources outside of Patch and also noting a perceived bias by some local publications that endorsed candidates (Patch does not endorse candidates).

"There's not enough publicity from the city to educate and promote voting in general. It's a lot of word of mouth, and I think the city can do a lot more to educate voters on the candidates and the issues," said Willis. "I didn't expect to win. If I'm being honest, I didn't expect to make a dent at all. I feel we're set up to fail when new people try to unseat the incumbents in this city."

Willis added that on the positive side, “I am pleased that 99 percent of the campaign was clean by the at-large candidates ... there was not much mud slinging or bashing overall. There were a couple quips here and there, but overall I'd say it was pretty congenial."

VanBuskirk, who abandoned his campaign after signing up to run, came in sixth with 163 votes.