Malibu voters have backed Councilmember Doug Stewart and newcomer Danny Smith for two City Council seats, but Smith's lead over incumbent Marianne Riggins is just 81 votes, according to updated Los Angeles County results released Monday.
The latest count, posted at 4:45 p.m. Nov. 9, shows Stewart leading the four-candidate field with 2,017 votes, or 32.38 percent. Smith has 1,963 votes (31.51 percent) and Riggins has 1,882 (30.21 percent). A. Sam Dibaei is far behind with 367 votes (5.89 percent). Voters could choose up to two candidates.
Results are not final until the county certifies the election and as of the last update there were about 12,000 votes remaining countywide. While the race for the second seat is close enough by number of votes, there are only a handful of Malibu specific ballots outstanding making it unlikely the results will change.
In the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District, four candidates have pulled clear of the field for four seats on the Board of Education.
Alicia Mignano leads with 26,196 votes (24.32 percent), followed by Robbie Staenberg with 24,179 (22.45 percent), Laurie Lieberman with 23,169 (21.51 percent) and Stacy Rouse with 22,519 (20.90 percent). Harry Leshner trails in fifth with 11,659 votes (10.82 percent), about 10,860 votes behind Rouse.
Brian Goldsmith is winning comfortably in the 24th State Senate District, a race between two Democrats for the seat Ben Allen is leaving. Allen was on the ballot this year for state insurance commissioner. Goldsmith has 195,161 votes (55.53 percent) to 156,280 (44.47 percent) for John M. Erickson, a lead of nearly 39,000 votes. The district covers Santa Monica, Malibu and much of the Westside.
In the 42nd Assembly District, Democrat Deborah Klein Lopez leads Republican Ted Nordblum 59.51 percent to 40.49 percent in the Los Angeles County part of the district, with 37,874 votes to 25,774. The district also reaches into Ventura County, and those votes are not in the county's totals. The seat opened up when Assemblymember Jacqui Irwin ran for Congress. Irwin leads the 26th Congressional District race with 58.75 percent of the Los Angeles County vote.
Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Sherman Oaks, is on track for another term in the 32nd Congressional District. He has 154,425 votes (70.62 percent) in the Los Angeles County part of the district, compared with 64,252 (29.38 percent) for Republican Larry Thompson. The district also includes part of Ventura County.
Across Los Angeles County, 3,132,612 ballots have been counted so far. That is 53.02 percent of the county's 5,908,408 registered voters. About 79 percent of the ballots came in by mail.