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| How have we gone this long without a Survivor reference? |
We haven’t done much analysis of the council races, but things will be different after August 14. Half the council seats (8) were up for election. As far as incumbents go, one council member, Janelle Fullbright, did not draw an opponent and is back on the council for four more years. One, Chris Soap, chose to run for Deputy Chief instead. Tina Glory Jordan, Bradley Cobb, Cara Cowan-Watts, and Julia Coates each had opponents. Cobb was the only incumbent who lost, in a new district. Finally, one race pitted two council members against each other, Jodie Fishinghawk and Harley Buzzard. Fishinghawk won that one.
Two new seats were created, and they were won by Lee Keener and David Walkingstick.
So the new council looks like this:
District One (Cherokee and Wagoner County): Tina Glory Jordan, David Walkingstick and Bill John Baker (for a few more weeks or two more years).
District Two (Adair, Delaware and Ottawa County): Jodie Fishinghawk, Curtis Snell and an open seat that will be vacated by Joe Crittenden on August 14 when he is sworn in as the Deputy Chief
District Three (Muskogee, McIntosh, Sequoyah Counties): Don Garvin, Janelle Fullbright, David Thornton
District Four (Mayes, Craig, Nowata, Craig, Washington County): Dick Lay, Chuck Hoskin, Jr., Meredith Frailey.
District Five: (Tulsa and Washington Counties): Buel Anglen, Cara Cowan-Watts, Lee Keener
At-Large: Julia Coates and Jack Baker
The short version is that Cobb, Soap, Crittenden and Buzzard are going to be off the council, replaced by Lay, Keener, Walkingstick and whoever replaces Crittenden on the council. Since Cobb, Soap and Buzzard were generally pretty friendly to Smith, he’s going to have a less friendly council to work with if he gets re-elected. Baker, if he’s elected, will have more friends on the council than he does now. Depending on how it shakes out in the council races, he might pick up a couple of more friends.
Since a chief has to work with the council to get his initiatives passed, these will be important things to think about moving ahead.
