Delay Picking Winner:Saratoga Springs Special Election Too Close To Call

BALLSTON SPA — Framed by a spire-topped church erected in 1835 that heralds a letterboard reading “God’s House, All Are Welcome,” and a single-story family home where a human figure in flannel clothes is, on this day busily shoveling away a late January snowfall, stands the county Board of Election complex, where inside a sublevel vault that runs maybe 50 feet long, ballots will be counted to presumably decide the winner of Saratoga Springs’ Special Election. 

Following nine days of Early Voting, and a 15-hour Special Election Day across Saratoga Springs on Jan. 28, the contest to decide the city’s DPW Commissioner/fifth City Council member through calendar year 2025 returned no known victor.   

Democrat Hank Kuczynski, the interim DPW Commissioner, ran as a write-in candidate. A total of 1,725 write-in votes were secured, although it is not yet known how many of those write-ins carried Kuczynski’s name. 

Republican Chuck Marshall secured 1,684 ballot votes.  

It is anticipated that a winner will not be known until at least next week. The counting of ballots will take place at the county Board of Elections complex in Ballston Spa. At press time, no date for the start of the counting process had been announced. 

Also of note: there are just under 300 absentee ballots yet to be returned. Regular absentee ballots need to be received at the BOE by Feb. 4; Military ballots by Feb. 10. 

A total of 3,409 votes have been tallied, according to unofficial reports from the Board of Elections. That represents about 16% of all active registered voters in Saratoga Springs. 

The next City Council meeting is Tuesday, Feb. 4. 

In November all five city council seats will be up for vote.