Crawfordsville’s and Frankfort’s incumbent mayors notched convincing wins in Tuesday’s primary election.
Crawfordsville Mayor Todd Barton received four times as many votes as opponent Johnathan Pickett.
Barton says Crawfordsville voters remember the positive changes he’s made since taking office three years ago.
“Basically, people understand that I’m a known quantity now. They know what they’re going to get and they know I’m going to work hard,” Barton says. “We have some really good projects that are beginning right now and underway right now and we’re going to move forward and continue making this a great community.”
Barton says the turnout rate looked low because of the limited amount of elections, but he’s still happy with it.
“They had one race in which they could vote. We did have one council race, but the rest of the city had one race to vote for,” Barton says. “So while turnout looked low, I think it was still pretty good considering people came out just to vote for one thing.”
Crawfordsville is a finalist in the Stellar Communities Program. Barton says he’ll spend his summer working on the city’s proposal.
Frankfort mayor Chris McBarnes won by a larger margin – scoring almost ten times as many votes as Ruth Dommestrup in an election defined by a large age difference between the candidates.
McBarnes says the numbers reflect both his campaign and mayoral style.
“I think, in order to finish number one, you constantly have to act like you’re number two. So, throughout the entirety of this race, we’ve ran this race like we run the city and that’s with relentless dedication and effort on a daily basis,” McBarnes says.
McBarnes believes his stance on employment resonated with the voters.
“We’ve got to put the people of Frankfort back to work and I think in order to create further sustainability in our community, we have to continue to synergize the creation of good jobs. That’s number one,” McBarnes says.
McBarnes says he will focus on rebuilding parks and downtown Frankfort to attract young professionals.
