‘Every vote counts.’ Muscogee school board special election decided by margin of only 2
The newest member of the Muscogee County School District Board was elected Tuesday night.
Patricia Frey defeated Laketha Ashe by only two votes in the special election to fill the nine-member board’s District 7 seat.
With all six precincts reporting, in-person advance voting and mail-in ballots, Frey received 147 votes to 145 for Ashe, according to the results released Tuesday by Nancy Boren, director of the Muscogee County Board of Elections and Registration.
Ashe received more of the advance votes (51-37 in person and 2-0 by mail), but Frey received more of the election day votes (110-92).
The vacancy on the MCSD board was created when District 7 representative Cathy Williams resigned, effective April 1, to join the 14-member Georgia Department of Transportation Board. She received the most votes for the appointment among the 24 state legislators whose districts are in or contiguous to the 2nd Congressional District.
After the election board certifies the results, the winner of the MCSD board special election will serve the rest of Williams’ four-year term through 2024. The seat will be up for re-election in its regular cycle in May 2024 with the other nonpartisan local offices on the ballot.
“The newly elected board member can be sworn in as soon as the local Probate Court receives the appropriate paperwork from the Georgia Secretary of State’s office and the oath of office can be administered,” MCSD board attorney Greg Ellington told the Ledger-Enquirer in a text message.
Reaction to the results
Reached by phone Tuesday night after the final results were released, Frey told the Ledger-Enquirer, “I’m excited, I’m honored, I’m humbled, but also it solidifies the fact of what we’ve been saying all along: Every vote counts. People might say, ‘Well, somebody else has got it’ or ‘It’s too hot to go out,’ but every vote counts to the last minute.”
Meeting as many voters as possible was key to her victory, Frey said.
“For the last three months,” she said, “I’ve been in every neighborhood across the district, knocking on doors, talking to people in their front yards, on their porches and everywhere else and talking about the issues and how I want to bring collaboration to the schools to meet the noneducational needs of the students so the teachers and administrators can do what they do, and that’s teach.”
Noting that Ashe received more of the advance votes, Frey praised the campaign workers who helped motivate voters to go to the polls and vote for her on election day.
“My gaggle of volunteers, last week and last weekend, we literally have blisters on our feet going to neighborhoods and today waving signs and greeting people,” she said. “And just reminding them, if you haven’t voted early, Tuesday is the day.”
When she joins the board, Frey wants to advocate for “employing best practices from one to school into the other schools so we have the same, equitable, equal access for all students.”
The Ledger-Enquirer didn’t reach Ashe for comment before publication.
Patricia Frey’s background
Frey, 55, is vice president of Home For Good, the United Way of the Chattahoochee Valley’s program dedicated to helping individuals and families move from homelessness to permanent and stable housing.
This was her first time running for a public office. She serves on the Mayor’s Commission for Re-Entry as the Housing Subcommittee chairwoman.
Her previous places of employment and job titles are Columbus Regional Healthcare System program coordinator, professional recruiter, SOURCE case manager, Norrell Services branch manager, Dr. Roger O’Bryan’s office manager and Housing Authority of Columbus manager.
Frey is a 1985 graduate of Baker High School in Columbus, where she has lived for more than 40 years. She took computer programming courses at Meadows College but didn’t earn a degree.
Lakesha Ashe’s background
Ashe, 48, owns a printing company, As He Leads, and Alana’s Beauty Supply,
This was Ashe’s third time on a District 7 ballot. She ran for the district’s Columbus Council seat last year. She finished second in that four-candidate race to qualify for the runoff, which Joanne Cogle won 454-373.
Before she became a business owner, Ashe worked for 18 years in customer service and claims at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia.
As a teenager in Panama City, Florida, she was a part-time paraprofessional in classrooms and in the office of an elementary school. After, she worked about six years doing patient intake at a psychiatry and counseling clinic.
Ashe graduated from Panama City’s Bay High School in 1992. Through dual enrollment, she earned an associate’s degree in accounting at Gulf Coast Community College in 1992. Two years later, she earned an associate’s degree in business administration from Gulf Coast.
Her other college degrees are a bachelor’s in psychology from Troy University-Fort Benning in 2006 and a master’s in psychology from the University of Phoenix-Columbus in 2010. She is enrolled in the University of Lynchburg’s online doctoral program for health care administration.
