Stone, Jones take leads in county commissioner races

EPHRATA — Grant County may have two brand-new county commissioners beginning in January 2020.

In the contest for Grant County Commission seat No. 1, north county farmer Danny Stone had 49.8 percent of the votes and led his opponent, former Grant County Sheriff’s Deputy Earl Romig, by roughly 200 votes in the unofficial tally on Election Day evening.

Stone and Romig are vying to win the seat held by four-term Grant County Commissioner Richard Stevens, who decided not to seek re-election this year.

In the race for Grant County Commission seat No. 2, challenger Rob Jones had a comfortable lead over the incumbent, Commissioner Tom Taylor. Jones had 58.7 percent of the vote and Taylor had 39.8 percent, according to unofficial results posted Tuesday.

“It’s going to be a close race,” Stone said from his home east of Hartline. “I’m really happy those thousands of people have cast a vote and shown their confidence in me.”

Stone cautioned, however, that there “are still a lot of votes to be counted.”

Romig, speaking from his home, where he was watching the national election results come in, was philosophical about unofficial results in the race.

“We’ll see, I guess time will tell,” he said. “I don’t know what to think and what to expect.”

Romig noted that Stone also won in the three-way Aug. 4 primary, garnering 43.9 percent of the votes cast to Romig’s 33.6 percent and Ephrata City Council member Mark Wanke’s 21 percent.

Neither Taylor nor Jones was available for comment Tuesday evening.

According to the Grant County Auditor’s website, 22,210 ballots were counted out of 28,656 ballots the auditor’s office received as of mid-afternoon on Monday.

The next tally of ballots will be available at 5 p.m. today, and the election is scheduled to be certified on Tuesday, Nov. 24.

Charles H. Featherstone can be reached at [email protected].