Three tightly-contested elections leave CCSD with three school board vacancies

CHARLESTON COUNTY, S.C. (WCBD) – Election officials are working to come up with answers for three tightly-contested Charleston County School District (CCSD) school board elections at once. In the District 6 election, Erica Cokley was re-elected to her seat.

“Erica Cokley was an active candidate for the November 8election that we had on Tuesday,” Isaac Cramer, executive director for the Charleston County Board of Elections said, “and the board certified her as the winner.”

But there’s an issue, Cokley says she never intended to run for re-election.

“In October,” Cramer said, “she spoke to several media and I got a call from media about it, and I told the media at the time, ‘I do not have a signed letter from her,’ which is required to be withdrawn from the ballot.”

That letter was sent by Cokley to the Board of Elections on Thursday of this week, two days after she was re-elected.

“The board ruled that since this happened after the election,” Cramer said, “and she was an active candidate on Tuesday, they would certify her as the winner.”

Cramer says they’ve done all they can and the next steps will be taken by local and state leaders.

“Anything else from here on out will be determined by the next stage,” he said, “from the school board, from the delegation and then ultimately, the governor appoints.”

In Districts 5 and 8, races between school board candidates are too close to call.

“First and second place,” Cramer said, “the difference between the two candidates was less than one percent, so that triggered the automatic recount.”

There’s only a five-vote difference between the candidates vying for District 5, and a 102-vote difference for the 8^th District.

“We are in the midst of rescanning every ballot from Election Day,” Cramer said, “from the absentee-by-mail ballots and all the early votes. So, we’ve been going through the recount since 2:00 p.m.”

Cramer says their goal is to have the results for each recount by the end of the night.