Menlo Park: Andrew Cohen stays ahead in council race Menlo Park: Andrew Cohen stays ahead in council race (November 17, 2004)

By Andrea Gemmet

Almanac Staff Writer

There are still more ballots to be tallied, but Menlo Park City Council candidate Andrew Cohen appears to be holding onto his narrow lead over Planning Commission member Lorie Sinnott for the second open seat on the council.

The latest update from the San Mateo County elections office shows Mr. Cohen with an 87-vote lead. He has a total of 5,340 votes to Ms. Sinnott's 5,253.

Planning Commissioner Kelly Fergusson is a lock for the first seat with 6,050 votes.

The fourth candidate, Michael Lambert, is trailing with 4,972 votes.

County elections manager David Tom said that while the count of absentee votes is just about finished, there remains somewhere between 10,000 and 15,000 provisional ballots to go through. It's unknown how many of those ballots were cast in Menlo Park.

Mr. Tom said he anticipates another update in election results will be released this week.

Counting provisional ballots is far more time-consuming than tallying absentees, he said.

Two of the council's five seats opened up when incumbents Paul Collacchi and Chuck Kinney declined to run again. Both men are completing their second terms on the City Council.

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