Preston's Congdon wins again

November 14, 2011 11:00 pm • Last Updated: November 15, 2011 5:23 pm

By Claire Bessette
Day Staff Writer

Preston First Selectman Robert Congdon, right, reacts after the final recount numbers are announced as Preston election officials conduct a municipal election recount for the First Selectman race between incumbent Robert Congdon, (R), and Timothy Bowles, (D), in the lower meeting room of the Preston Town Hall Tuesday, Nov. 15, 2011. Walter Kornosewicz, left, representing Tim Bowles looks on.

Preston – Incumbent Republican First Selectman Robert Congdon came out victorious again this morning, but lost one vote in the recount of last Tuesday's close election.

In the recount, Congdon received 609 votes to Democratic Selectman Timothy Bowles' 593. There was also a handful of write-ins that were not part of the recount.

During the recount, which lasted nearly three hours, election officials counted the same number of total ballots by hand as last Tuesday, 1,211, but when the ballots were fed into the machine, it registered only 1,210.

Congdon speculated that two ballots might have been stuck together when election moderator Ted Powell and Democratic Registrar Ellie Michaud fed the ballots into the machine today.

Preston election officials including Ted Powell, center, election moderator and Ellie Michaud, Democratic registrar of voters feed absentee ballots into voting machine during a municipal election recount for the First Selectman race between incumbent Robert Congdon, (R), and Timothy Bowles, (D), in the lower meeting room of the Preston Town Hall Tuesday, Nov. 15, 2011. Selectman Robert Congdon, right foreground looks on.

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