EAST HARRIS COUNTY Voters in East Harris County expressed contentment for the jobs that local elected officials have been doing, returning two incumbents to their posts.
State Representative Joe Crabb beat another Joe- Joe Montemayor with 65% of the vote to win the District 127 seat.
Justo Perez came in a distant third with 2% votes.
Ken Jones, who has served as constable for Harris County Precinct 3, will keep his badge as voters overwhelming supported him in his reelection bid. He beat challenger Tony Lewis 67% to 32%.
Crosby ISD
Voters in the Crosby ISD service area returned two incumbents to the board In Position 4 Sheryl Shaw defeated Kathie S. Slotter 63%-36%. Dan Kasprzak, who holds the Position 6 seat, edged out Will Locke 50.4% to 49.5% or a difference of 49 votes. Gerald Blankenship ran unopposed for the seat that was held by Earl Boykin.
Huffman ISD
Winners in the Huffman ISD Board Election were Charles Bardwell, Dean Tinnin, Denise Shirley and Guy Smith.
Harris County
Ed Emmett, who took over as county judge when Robert Eckels resigned the post, beat Democrat David Mincberg with 53% of the votes.
Republican Pat Lykos will be the first woman to serve as Harris County District Attorney. She beat out Democrat C.O. Bradford 50.2 to 49.7%, less than 5,000 votes. Mike Stafford was a victim of the Democratic straight ticket voter, losing 51-48% to Vince Ryan.
Democrat Adrian Garcias attempt to unseat Sheriff Tommy Thomas was successful, as he got 56% of the vote. In the race for Harris County Tax Assessor/ Collector Paul Bettancourt defeated Democrat Diane Trautman 51% to 46%.
National Races
The Goose Creek CISD held a presidential election prior to Tuesdays national election. Goose Creek students selected Barack Obama as the next president. The nations voters concurred, sending him and running mate Joe Biden to Washington D.C. with 333 electoral votes to Republican nominees John McCain and Sarah Palins 155 votes.
In other national races, Senator John Cornyn lost to Democratic challenger Rick Noriega, who recorded 50.7% of the votes. Congressman Gene Green will get two more years in Washington after beating Republican Eric Story and Libertarian Joel Grace.
The race for Congressional District 2 was a landslide with Republican Ted Poe outpacing Libertarian Craig Wolfe 89% to 11%.
Texas Secretary of State Hope Andrade estimated that 68% of registered voters cast ballots, either during early voting or on Election Day. This is the second highest percentage in Texas history, with the highest coming at 73% in 2004.