Irmo voters pick a familiar face for town council in Tuesday’s special election
Irmo now has a full complement of town council members for the first time since November.
On Tuesday night, financial planner Gabriel Penfield won Irmo’s open council seat in a special election with 478 votes, or 76% of those cast. It represents a comeback for a candidate who narrowly lost his bid for an at-large seat during the regular November election.
Penfield defeated George Frazier, who had 148 votes, or 23.5%, Tuesday.
The road to Tuesday’s special election took a few strange turns on the way.
It started on Election Day in November, when former town councilman Bill Danielson defeated incumbent Mayor Barry Walker for the top job in the town of 11,000 northwest of Columbia.
That opened up a new seat on Irmo Town Council, since Danielson had to resign his seat to become mayor.
Both Penfield and Frazier ran for at-large town council seats in that same November election, but came up short. Penfield lost by 25 votes, while Frazier was ruled ineligible before the election becausehe had not updated his voter registration after moving from Richland County to Lexington County. The Lexington County Election and Voter Registration Office said Frazier straightened out his registration this time around.
So the two candidates who ran and lost for at-large seats in 2023 were back running again and this time Penfield got his council seat..
