Banks City Hall. Photo: Brenda Schaffer
Polls closed at 8 p.m., and moments later, the first wave of numbers were released on the Oregon Secretary of State’s election results website, confirming that the candidates running unopposed for a city council race — Jeff Thompson for CC2, Peter Edison for CC4, and Mike Rainey for CC6 — have won their respective races.
This was an expected outcome, with no organized write-in campaigns to oppose the candidates.
According to the initial results, which will change as more ballots are counted, and will be certified later in November, for CC2, Jeff Thompson has so far received 96.24% of the vote, with the remaining votes going to write in candidates. For CC4, current mayor Peter Edison has so far received 93.44% of the vote. For CC6, Mike Rainey has so far received 97.29% of the vote.
Thompson and Rainey will both be newcomers to the council when they are sworn in after the election, a short ceremony usually held during the January regular city council meeting. Edison, currently serving as Banks’ mayor, is no stranger to serving as a councilor, having held that role from 2003 to 2013 prior to his election as mayor.
Mike Rainey and his wife, Kim Rainey, a district manager for FedEx Office, live in Arbor Village with four children, ages 6, 4, and two eight-month-old twins, as well as Roxy, their dog, and Sausage, their cat.
Jeff Thompson and his wife and family moved to Banks in 2012, Thompson said during an interview with the Banks Post. He has three teenage children; this fall, Thompson has a senior, junior and a middle school aged student in his home.
Facing the new and returning councilors are a number of issues, including the city’s response to the dual economic and health threat of the COVID-19 pandemic; questions of development and growth amid a struggling municipal water system, questions about Banks’ response to racism and policing after around 300 people marched in Banks in June in support of Black lives, and more.
Chas Hundley is the editor of the Banks Post and sister news publications the Gales Creek Journal and the Salmonberry Magazine. He grew up in Gales Creek and has a cat.