Cr Reg Kidd has one hand on the mayoral chair but is facing an anxious wait with the final result of the Orange City Council elections not likely to be declared until Wednesday.
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Cr Kidd was leading the mayoral race by 641 votes from Cr Russell Turner on Monday afternoon as counting of postal votes continued.
The NSW Electoral Commission is predicting mayoral preferences will be allocated on Wednesday with the result soon after.
The result of the battle for the 11 remaining positions on council is not likely to be finalised until Thursday.
On Monday afternoon the candidates likely to be elected included: Sam Romano, Joanne McRae, Cr Kevin Duffy, Cr Jason Hamling, Tony Mileto, Stephen Nugent, Cr Kidd and Cr Turner.
Cr Scott Munro, Cr Glenn Taylor, Mario Previtera and Cr Jeff Whitton are among those who will be relying on preferences.
Cr Kidd said it was a nervous wait.
“My guts are churning over at 100 mile an hour, it’s like expecting your first child, seriously, or waiting for higher school certificate results to come out,” he said.
“I haven’t slept well, I’ve been trying to keep myself busy to get away from it.
“Why does it take so long?”
Cr Kidd said some Sydney council results were already known.
“It’s another side of the city dominates what’s done quite frankly.”
He said that if elected mayor, fixing roads and footpaths would be a priority.
“It’s time to really look at our basic infrastructure, particularly the roads and the footpaths,” he said.
“Everybody uses the roads and the footpaths and I think its time we have really got to concentrate on getting that basic infrastructure right for everybody.”
He said that with the high number of candidates it would be a tough fight to get on council.
“I think it’s all over the place and very diluted, it will go right down to preferences.”
He said voters had been confused by the ballot papers which had led to a lot of informal votes.
“I was really disappointed in the high percentage of informal votes, it was an incredible thing, it was 12 or 13 per cent.”
That included two nuns he spoke to at Kenna Hall who said they had only voted on one of the two ballot papers.
He said the paper had favoured tickets rather than independents and questioned why the word ‘Ungrouped’ was not above the independents’ column.
“It disadvantaged the true independents, you read from left to right and it was right over on the far side.”
Cr Kidd also said the groups’ positions on the tickets had favoured those on the far left of the paper.
“I’ve been in council a long time and we all know there are a certain amount of donkey votes,” he said.
“Some people are voted out, they’re sick of voting.
“I’m on my way down the street or I’m off to sport, I’ve gotta vote or I’ll get fined.
“You grab that form, you read from left to right, boom, you put a one on it and it’s a formal vote.”
“The Electoral Office, they haven’t explained the process really well to people and they haven’t set the form out very well.”
He has been kept busy during the wait repairing fences on his property after they were damaged when a car drove them during a police chase on Sunday.
Cr Kidd is also hoping his beloved Emus rugby team can win their grand final on Saturday to cap a remarkable double for him.
“I’d love to see it, they’re a great club,” said the life member and former Emus player.
Joanne McRae is on track to be the first female councillor in several years.
“Our team polled really well and we've done well across all the different polling booths - that's an indication you're seen as representing all parts of the community and that's really nice to see,” she said.
She said the third member of her ticket, Darryl Curran, could get elected after a strong personal vote.