Here are your write-in winners: Ford is new mayor of Birchwood, Riehle is new supervisor in Stillwater Township

Mary Divine, Pioneer Press
·2 min read

After all the votes were counted, Margaret Ford found herself the winner of the mayoral race in Birchwood Village — even though her name never appeared on the ballot.

Ford won the election with 271 write-in votes cast on Election Day. The Birchwood Village City Council canvassed the results on Tuesday night.

Ford, 62, a retired attorney, initially planned to run for mayor after Mayor Mary Wingfield announced she was not going to seek re-election, but changed her mind when a family member developed a potential health problem.

When the health issue was resolved, Ford decided to mount a write-in campaign that involved knocking on almost every door in the city and flooding the city with campaign signs. The signs were put up during the overnight hours of Sept. 30.

“We flooded the zone,” Wingfield said. “We did it in the dark of night, so when everyone woke up the next morning, they were, like, ‘What just happened?’”

The other candidates, James Nelson and Michael McKenzie, received 171 votes and 148 votes, respectively.

Stillwater Township also had a race that was determined by write-in as no one filed to run for the township supervisor Seat 2.

Sixty write-in votes were cast in that race, and the township’s canvass board, which met Tuesday, declared Jim Riehle the winner with 14 votes. Riehle, a master technician at 3M, ran unsuccessfully for township supervisor in 2008.

Riehle is the husband of Township Clerk Barb Riehle.

Township Board Chairwoman Sheila-Marie Untiedt said it was not a conflict of interest for Barb Riehle to run the election because Jim Riehle’s name “wasn’t on the ballot, instead he was write-in candidate.”

As of Tuesday night, Jim Riehle had not yet accepted the position, Untiedt said.

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