Election Night in Humboldt County was low on drama, and low on turnout, too. It is unclear how many ballots remain to be counted, as will likely be the case for another week, but the Elections Office counted 20,258 ballots in its final election night report. That’s 42 percent of the final tally from the primary four years earlier.

Even with scores of ballots remaining uncounted, no local races appear in doubt.

The Humboldt Cannabis Reform Initiative, known as Measure A, which sought to overhaul cannabis cultivation regulations countywide, was resoundingly rejected by 73 percent of voters. While proponents of the measure cast it as a way to protect small farms and add teeth to existing environmental and neighborhood protections, opponents, including much of the cannabis industry, argued it was bad policy and would have dire consequences for local farms.

Embattled Humboldt County Superior Court Judge Greg Kreis’ efforts to win a second term on the bench, meanwhile, seem to have fallen decidedly short, with challenger April Van Dyke leading the race with 60 percent of the votes cast thus far. Appointed in 2017, Kreis faces a bombshell ethics complaint filed against him by the Commission on Judicial Performance about a month before Election Day. He's denied the allegations.

On the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors’ front, incumbents ran away with the races early and didn’t look back. In the First District, three-term incumbent Rex Bohn has a commanding lead over challengers U.S. Coast Guard veteran Gordon Clatworthy and Fields Landing resident Jerry McGuire, having taken 64 percent of the vote, trailed by Clatworthy's 24 percent and McGuire's 12 percent.

In the Second District, incumbent Michelle Bushnell fended off challenges from Fortuna school board member Jeana McClendon and cannabis entrepreneur Brian D. Roberts, taking 58 percent of the vote to McClendon's 36 percent and Roberts' 6 percent.

Up in the Third District, meanwhile, incumbent Mike Wilson cruised to his third term, taking 81 percent of the vote to challenger and dispensary owner Roy Gomez Jr.’s 19 percent.

The race for the Second District state Assembly seat being vacated by the retiring Jim Wood, meanwhile, remains too close to call, with Arcata-based state Democratic Party Chair Rusty Hicks (18.9 percent) and Santa Rosa City Councilmember Chris Rogers (19.6 percent) vying to join Republican Crescent City school board member Michael Greer in a November runoff. Incumbent North Coast Congressmember Jared Huffman, meanwhile, is cruising into his November runoff having taken 72.5 percent of the vote to Republican Chris Coulombe’s 17.4 percent.

There were, of course, also presidential races on the ballot, with Republican Donald Trump taking 1.1 million votes and incumbent Democrat Joe Biden notching 1.6 million votes statewide in their party primaries along percentages that tracked in Humboldt County.

Humboldt County Registrar of Voters Juan Pablo Cervantes told KMUD on Election Night he believed the county was “looking at a pretty low voter turnout” compared to 2020. Cervantes said elections staff would continue to tabulate late-arriving vote by mail ballots (and those that arrive before March 12), those dropped off at the polls and provisional ballots cast on Election Day, an effort that will extend for weeks. Post-election reports will be issued weekly until official results are certified no later than April 4.