Mayoral races, Durham housing bond highlight Election Day

Voters in dozens of North Carolina towns and cities head to the polls Tuesday to pick their local leaders.

Mayoral elections in Durham, Chapel Hill and several Wake County towns and a $95 million affordable housing bond on the Durham ballot are among the 292 races in 21 central North Carolina counties that WRAL News will track.

November 2019 Election Results

The State Board of Elections experienced problems Tuesday morning with its online tools for voters to check their polling sites and sample ballots. An error made during preparations for Election Day knocked the tools offline for about an hour.

"We apologize for any inconvenience caused by this issue," Karen Brinson Bell, executive director of the elections board, said in a statement. "The voter tools have been restored, and we encourage all eligible voters to cast ballots in today’s municipal elections. Voting has gone smoothly so far across the state."

• Municipal election guide

A steady stream of voters flowed through Durham County polling sites for much of the day.

"I hope that the people that are running, they make a change. We need a change," voter Lesley Bethea said. "Too much has happened in Durham for a change to happen overnight, but with the right people sitting on City Council, maybe we can get things done."

Bethea said crime prevention is her top concern, especially with a string of drive-by shootings last week that killed two people.

"A lot has happened in the last couple of weeks in Durham, and it’s not good. We have got to change in order to get better," she said. "The violence, the unnecessary violence, the shooting of too many young black men, too many young people, period. It’s just been really bad lately. We need a change on that."

For Joe and Christina Ananias, who recently bought their first home in Durham, passing the affordable housing bond is critical.

"This is a way for us to say, 'Let’s make it a little bit easier for people to find a good place to live and raise their families,'" Christina Ananias said.

"I’m always interested in voting for people who have the best interests of the city in mind, especially those who don’t have the resources or some of the privileges that some others of us enjoy," Joe Ananias said.

{
    "name": "follow",
    "attrs": [],
    "children": null
}