Votes roll in slowly but surely

By Emily Donohoe

Sep 19, 2024

Murray River Council residents in the Greater Murray and Moama wards cast their votes on Saturday, September 14, with counting still in progress. Photo: Aidan Briggs Photo by Aidan Briggs

While it is still too early to call the Murray River Council election, votes continue to be counted.

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At the time of going to print on Thursday, 2223 out of 3129 votes from the Greater Murray ward have been counted, and 2144 from 3134 in Moama.

For the Moama ward, no candidate is yet to hit the progressive quota of 526. Leading with 444 is Gen Campbell, followed by John Harvie on 426 and Bianca Hurn on 415.

The next candidate with the highest number of votes is Christopher Bilkey on 297, then Graeme Blow on 244, most recent mayor Frank Crawley on 142 and Michael John Ludeman on 133.

In the Greater Murray ward, two candidates have reached the 510 progressive quota. These are Kylie Berryman leading on 607 and sitting councillor Geoffrey Wise on 515.

Following these are Joy Lorraine Allan on 289 and Norman Berger on 281. Sitting councillors Thomas Weyrich and Kronrod Nicholas are trailing on 239 and 106, respectively.

Voting moved into the check count phase on Tuesday, September 17, afternoon.

According to the NSW electoral commission, this involves batching, or counting the ballot papers into bundles of 25 without examining the preferences, and data entry.

The election will be declared when all postal votes have been received and counted.