The people of Santa Clara have chosen a new city clerk and police chief. According to early data, Cory Morgan has a big lead in the race to replace retiring Police Chief Pat Nikolai.
Morgan is ahead with 65.9% of the vote as of Wednesday. He is behind Lt. Mario Brasil of the San Jose Police Department, who has 34.1% of the vote. Also, the city is about to re-elect two members and add two new people to the City Council.
A little over 44.6% of people in the county have voted, and more than 468,000 votes have been cast. It was Wednesday, and there are still 208,000 votes to be counted.
Morgan, 46, has been a police officer in Santa Clara since 2007 and was made a lieutenant in 2020. He had earlier told San José Spotlight that his main goal would be to hire more officers for the department, which he said was 20% understaffed and had the money to do so.
The person running against him, Brasil, has lived in Santa Clara all his life but works for the San Jose Police Department. Brasil, who is 50 years old, said that if he had been chosen, he would have focused on hiring people and making the department more open by updating its website and using more technology.
A few of Morgan’s supporters joined him as he watched the first election returns come in Tuesday night. He said that he can’t wait for the next round of votes to come out on Wednesday at 5 p.m., because that will show the direction of the vote, since there are still thousands of votes to count.
“It’s exciting, and I’m encouraged by the lead, but I know there are still a lot of votes to be counted,” Morgan told San José Spotlight.
People also chose the next city clerk because Hosam Haggag did not run for another term. With 31.3% of the vote, retired Lt. Robert O’Keefe of the California Highway Patrol is in first place. Steve Kelly, who got 27.2% of the vote, is ahead of him. 27% of the votes went to Poornima Gopi, and 14.3% went to Paul Tacci.
When asked for a response, O’Keefe did not answer. His website and campaign statement say that he wants to make the city clerk’s job as chief elections administrator a top priority. He says that it’s important that the job stay nonpartisan.
In 2020, O’Keefe ran against a council member named Suds Jain and lost. After that, he was on the Santa Clara County Civil Grand Jury for one year. Since then, the grand jury has criticized the current council many times for how it works and how it handles Levi’s Stadium.
Kelly, who is 62 years old, was on the Santa Clara Planning Commission for eight years. He said he wanted to focus on getting more people to vote, especially young people.
In Santa Clara, voters overwhelmingly decided that they wanted to keep choosing their police chiefs and city clerks. This was after two attempts in March failed to make these roles appointed.