Two State College Borough Council members will look to keep their seats in the fall, while one Democrat and two Republicans will be vying for a first term on council.
With the top three vote getters moving on to November’s election, council member Evan Myers, vice president and chief operating officer at AccuWeather, led the way on the Democratic ballot with 25.52 percent (1298 votes). Fellow incumbent Theresa Lafer, who works in staff support services at Penn State, came in second with 18.36 percent (934 votes).
Seeking office for the first time, Dan Murphy, director of Penn State’s Office for Student Orientation and Transition Programs, came in third with 16.2 percent (824 votes) to secure one of the three nominations.
They were followed by recent Penn State master’s degree graduate Marina Cotarelo (14.49 percent), retired human resources executive Steve Mower (13.98 percent) and Penn State undergraduate Rylie Cooper (11.15 percent).
On the Republican side, only two candidates ran so both will be on the November ballot, each seeking to win one of three seats up for election. Former state representative Lynn Herman received 429 votes and Richard Fitzgerald, a senior purchasing agent at Penn State, got 385.
The new political action committee BugPAC had some successes in its first time endorsing candidates in borough elections. The group formed by former Penn State student government leaders to ‘reclaim State College’ for all residents, including students, threw its support behind three council candidates and one mayoral candidate, while encouraging students to register to vote and submit absentee ballots before leaving at the end of spring semester.
The committee endorsed primary winners Myers and Murphy as well as Cotarelo. Their mayoral candidate, business owner Michael Black, came in second in the Democratic primary, 170 votes behind Don Hahn.
