Voters Send Ury, Schlicht Back to Council

Barack Obama isn't the only one who gets to keep his job.

With all precincts counted, Mayor Frank Ury and Councilwoman Cathy Schlicht have defeated four challengers to return to the Mission Viejo City Council.

Challenger Wendy Bucknum received 302 fewer votes than Schlicht to end the race in third place.

Here is the final vote tally:

-Mayor Frank Ury: 14,753 (27.2 percent)

-Councilwoman Cathy Schlicht: 12,557 (23.1 percent)

-Challenger Wendy Bucknum: 12,255 (22.6 percent)

-Challenger Ed Sachs: 8,068 (14.8 percent)

-Challenger Richard Coleman: 3,795 (7 percent)

-Challenger Desi Kiss: 2,906 (5.3 percent)

Early in the evening as the results came in, Bucknum attended a post-election party with Ury, Councilman Dave Leckness and Councilwoman Trisha Kelley, among others.

Bucknum said she was happy with her campaign.

"I've done all I can. Here is the support," she said, gesturing to the partygoers. "I worked really hard and that's all you can do."

Frank Ury said he was confident the early tallies indicated his future success at the poll. He's been elected twice before by the largest number of votes in city history.

"I'm just really hoping Wendy can prevail," he said. "Hopefully we out-hustled them."

Leckness has supported Bucknum and Ury, most recently by standing on street corners and greeting residents for the past four nights. He said mail-in voters might have favored Schlicht because they didn't yet meet Bucknum.

Leckness said Bucknum and her campaign crew visited "almost every house in Mission Viejo."

Schlicht refused to comment.

"I have no respect for your publication," she told Patch.

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