There will be three new faces around the table when the Gore District Council meets next, according to just-released preliminary results to this year's local elections.

They are Richard McPhail (3014 votes), who was elected to the District-wide ward, Nick Grant (1387 votes), who was elected to the Gore ward, and Stewart MacDonell, who gained the Kaiwera-Waimumu ward unopposed.

All sitting councillors were returned to office.

Gore District Council mayor Tracy Hicks retained his seat unopposed. This will be his sixth term as mayor.

The Mataura Community Board also has a new member with Steve (Boko) Dixon elected (1191 votes).

This is a preliminary result. The final result will be posted next week.

Gore District Mayor Tracy Hicks said he was looking forward to working with the new council.

“The new councillors bring a good mix of skills to the table.”

The mayor intends to meet individually with each member of his team over the next week or so. 

The statutory meeting at which the mayor and councillors are sworn in will be held on Tuesday, October 29.

As of Friday, 43.44% of voters (3,809 voters) had cast their vote. This does not include votes in transit to the processing centre and special votes.

Preliminary results:

This result is based upon the counting of approximately 95% of the returned votes. The progress result does not include some special votes and votes returned today that are still in transit to the processing

centre. The outcome of these elections may change once all votes have been counted.

Gore Ward (5 vacancies) Votes Received

REID, Bronwyn 1,791

GRANT, Doug 1,662

HIGHSTED, Bret 1,600

GRANT, Nick 1,387

DICKSON, Glenys Independent 1,225

DUNCAN, Adam 893

INFORMAL 3

BLANK VOTING PAPERS 31

Council - At Large (3 vacancies) Votes Received

MCPHAIL, Richard 3,014

DAVIS, Nicky 2,438

BOLGER, Cliff 2,300

DIXON, Steven Boko 1,191

INFORMAL 2

BLANK VOTING PAPERS 142

Mataura Community Board (5 vacancies) Votes Received

SINCLAIR, Linda 296

TAYLOR, Sue 288

TAYLOR, Alan 263

DIXON, Steven Boko 228

CHAFFEY, Greg 215

THOMAS, Lisa Jayne 174

ROWLING, Tanya 152

INFORMAL 0

BLANK VOTING PAPERS 1