Lewis County voters fail to approve Sales Tax increase for schools

Local and state political candidates fought for their seats all through the summer, waiting for Thursday, August 6, to arrive. Here in Lewis County, we had 2,719 show up to polls to cast their votes.

The widely debated Sales Tax Referendum, where taxes would have been raised from 2.5 percent to 2.75 percent to help with school projects, was voted down by only 195 votes. The people of Lewis County voted 1,213 for the referendum and 1,408 against.

Winning by 3 votes was Paula Dyer with 114 votes for School Board, District 8, over Nancy McDonald, with 111 votes. Chad Spears came in third with 96 votes.

Kyle Bobo was voted onto the County Commission for District 4 with 87 votes over Kaye Wise. Bobo received 185 votes, while Wise acquired 98 votes.

Travis Hinson was re-named Assessor of Property with 2,086 votes. Billy Meek tallied 507 votes.

Joyce Holt was re-elected as Highway Commissioner with 1,750 votes, over Richie Carroll who collected 891 votes.

Glenda Atkinson was re-elected to serve on the School Board for District 2 with 244 votes. Derek Cotham was elected to be the voice for District 4 on the School Board with 249 votes. Jack Holt was elected for School Board, District 6, with 258 votes and Blake Farr was re-elected to serve District 9 on the School Board with 187 votes.

Lewis Countians showed their blood ran red when voting for United States Senate. Bill Hagerty came in with 1,119 votes and Manny Sethi with 865 votes, while Democratic candidates only received 301 votes as a whole. Democratic candidate Marquita Bradshaw received 83 votes, Robin Kimbrough collected 75 votes, George G. Davis had 59 votes, James Mackler received 51 votes and Mark Pickrell had 33 votes.

David "Coach" Byrd won Tennessee House of Representatives in Lewis County by only 19 votes. Byrd received 1,008 votes, Austin Carroll collected 989, and Gary Welch came in with 142 votes.

Mike Spitzer was uncontested for Circuit Court Judge and received 2,369 votes. Joey Hensley was also uncontested and re-elected for Tennessee Senate with 2,016 votes in Lewis County.

Statewide Results:

Republican and Democratic candidates were selected for November's political race for a seat in the U.S. Senate. Bill Hagerty won the Republican nomination by about 74,000 votes over Manny Sethi. Hagerty came in with 330,893 votes while Sethi managed to grab 256,732 votes, and George Flinn of Memphis got 22,428 votes. The remaining Republican candidates had less than 9,000 votes statewide.

The Democratic nomination was taken by Marquita Bradshaw with 117,345 votes, coming in second was Robin Kimbrough with 87,846 votes, and third was candidate James Mackler with 78,568 votes.

Tennessee House of Representatives, another hotly contested seat, was won by David "Coach" Byrd with 5,474 votes, Austin Carroll, of Hohenwald, came in second with 1,907 votes, and third was Gary Welch with 1,859 votes.

The uncontested Tennessee Senate seat was taken by Joey Hensley, voted in with 20,981 votes, and Mike Spitzer was named Circuit Court Judge with 35,963 votes, also uncontested.

To view how each district voted, click the charts at the bottom of the story.