Early voting in run-off for Gainesville city commission seat starts Friday

Gainesville voters will begin heading to the polls Friday to choose between Cynthia Moore Chestnut and Matt Howland who will next occupy the At-large B seat on the Gainesville City Commission.

Early voting will be held from 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Friday through Sunday at the Alachua County Supervisor of Elections Office inside the Josiah T. Walls Building at 515 N. Main St. and the Millhopper Branch Library at 3145 NW 43rd St.

Polls for the run-off election will be open Tuesday from 7 a.m.-7 p.m.

The runoff is being held because none of the five candidates could get more than 50 percent of the vote in the first special election on Nov. 16 to fill the open seat vacated last year by Gail Johnson.

Howland is a newcomer to local politics, and Chestnut has decades of experience in elected offices.

The at-large Seat B seat has a term that ends in January 2025.

Turnout was brisk for a single-election issue in the November election, where Chestnut received about 46%, or 5,400 votes, compared to Howland, who garnered 41.2%, with 4,840 votes.

Chestnut has served as chairwoman of the Alachua County Democratic Party, on the Gainesville City and Alachua County commissions and has also represented the 23rd District in the Florida House of Representatives.

Chestnut said her campaign is working hard to get votes in the runoff.

“We’ve been very busy knocking on doors, communicating with the voters and working,” she said. “We did a mailer during the holidays and we canvassed the neighborhoods.”

Chestnut said her campaign is focusing on neighborhood preservation and lowering electric bills in Gainesville.

“My message is that preservation and development are not enemies,” she said. “I support both of them, but appropriately placed. We also must address utility rates.”

She said the city needs to fund weatherization programs to improve the energy efficiency of homes to lower bills, and that the commission should consider reducing the transfer of electric funds to the city budget by even more than what it has already approved.

The commission has approved a resolution to reduce the electric bill revenue transfer each year into the city's general budget by $2 million through 2027, starting with fiscal year 2022 when the transfer is reduced down to $36.2 million.

“Utility bills are just eating people alive,” Chestnut said. “Bills are so high and it is very devastating for people who are poor and people who are on a fixed income. Something must be done to address that.”

She acknowledged that reducing the transfer would result in less revenue to fund the city's general fund budget, but said the commission needs to tighten its belt on spending.

“I think we have to look at where we can adjust that budget," Chestnut said.

Howland is a former history teacher at Westwood Middle School and founder of the after-school fitness nonprofit organization Youth Combine. A resident of downtown Gainesville, he serves on the Downtown Strategic Plan Advisory Board and works for military and veteran service organizations.

Campaign volunteers in the Howland camp have been knocking on doors talking to voters incessantly in the closing weeks of the election, said Claudia Tio-Cartagena, Howland's campaign's field organizer.

"I’ve had volunteers and interns with me most days trying to talk to as many voters as we can, just spreading the message that Matt is the right guy for the job. I’ve had so many positive conversations," she said.

Howland has a campaign that is forward-thinking and appealing to young voters, Tio-Cartagena said.

“He is willing to tackle these issues head on and look at them critically,” she said. “It is going to take effort from our community and conversations to transition to solar. That’s what I appreciate about Matt. He is willing to have these difficult conversations.”

Information from a previously published article written by Gainesville Sun reporter John Henderson was used in this report.

This article originally appeared on The Gainesville Sun: Gainesville City Commission run-off election on Tuesday