Curry loses bid to return to Colorado State House

Fewer than 300 votes separate the two

The official count of under votes from the Secretary of State in the House District 61 race could still be several days away, but election officials in the five counties represented – Gunnison, Pitkin, Garfield, Eagle and Hinsdale – have reported and by their cumulative tally Independent candidate Kathleen Curry lost the race to Democrat Roger Wilson by fewer than 300 votes.

“I’m not close enough to continue the fight,” Curry said Wednesday. “But I feel like this is a temporary setback and this is just the beginning for me.”
Officials in each county have spent more than a week counting more than 2,000 under votes, which is the difference between the number of overall votes cast in the election and the number of votes cast in the House District 61 race. Of the under votes, more than 602 would have to go to two-term representative Kathleen Curry to seal a victory.  
Any of those under votes could be votes for Curry, and district judge John Madden ordered that each of the under votes be counted by hand after Secretary of State Bernie Buescher refused to order it himself.
After the counting finished in Gunnison County Tuesday, November 16, out of a total 407 under votes counted, 78 went to representative Curry. Gunnison election official Diane Folowell said the judges order only required the counties to determine if the box was checked or if the name on the line was intended to be Curry’s.
If the name was filled in but the oval next to the line was left blank, Madden ordered that the vote be counted.
Pitkin County counted 110 votes in favor of Curry out of 597 under votes, Eagle County counted just 14 votes for Curry and Hinsdale, which was the first county to complete its inspection, counted 7 votes for the representative from Gunnison.
Garfield County was the last county to finish its tally, as they had nearly twice as many – 800 – votes as Gunnison County to count. When the final number came in Wednesday morning, it was 94 votes and not enough to bring Curry into contention.
 “I think we did pretty well considering it was a write-in campaign. I don’t have any reason to hang my head,” Curry said. “There was so much support for running as an Independent and serving as an Independent and I plan on continuing to pursue public office in the future.”