Johnson County voters go to polls Tuesday for supervisor special election

IOWA CITY - Johnson County voters will choose the fifth member of the county's Board of Supervisors in a special election Tuesday.

Republican Phil Hemingway, 58, is running against Democrat Royceann Porter, 52, for a seat with a term that lasts through 2020.

Polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m.

The seat became vacant after Supervisor Kurt Friese died in October.

Hemingway, an Iowa City Community School Board member and small business owner, is running on a platform of rural representation and fiscal responsibility.

Porter, a union organizer who campaigned on a message of diversity and inclusion, said she hopes to continue Friese's work in increasing efforts to grow food on the Johnson County Historic Poor Farm.

Tuesday is the fourth election in four months for Iowa City voters. The city saw a council primary election, a special election for a vacant council seat and November's general election.

Special elections typically see low voter turnout. In the last special election for a supervisor seat, in January 2016, voters elected current Democrat Lisa Green-Douglass over no-party Chris Hoffman, 2,015 to 1,263, for a turnout of 3.6 percent of registered voters.

The last time a Republican won a seat on the Johnson County Board of Supervisors was in a March 2013 when John Etheredge won a special election. Voter turnout was 6.7 percent, with 6,113 ballots cast.

He lost his bid for a full term in the November 2014 general election.

The last Republican supervisor to win a general election was Oren Alt, who was elected to the board in 1956.

Johnson County supervisors earn $77,239 a year. Their responsibilities include approving county budgets and levying taxes, entering into contracts on behalf of the county and supervising the secondary roads system.

Whoever is elected Dec. 18 will join Supervisors Rod Sullivan, Janelle Rettig, Lisa Green-Douglass and Mike Carberry, all Democrats, on the county board.

Carberry's term expires at year's end, with Supervisor Pat Heiden, also a Democrat, taking that seat.

ELECTION DAY

Polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. Tuesday. Seventeen precincts will be combined into eight locations:

' Big Grove, Cedar and Solon - Solon City Hall

' Coralville 1 and 4 - Coralville Public Library

' Iowa City 19 and 20 - Iowa City Senior Center

' Iowa City 5 and 11 - University of Iowa Main Library

' Iowa City 6 and 16 - Mercer Park Aquatic Center

' North Liberty 1 and 5 - North Liberty Community Center

' Graham and Newport - Celebration Farm

' City of Hills and Liberty-Pleasant Valley - Hills Community Center.

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