Wasatch County Council certified the election results Wednesday of the race for WWasatch County Council certified the election results Wednesday of the race for Wasatch County School District Seat E. The certification comes three months after Tom Stone, who secured 41% of the vote — was disqualified from the race.
Bradley Ehlert, who secured 38% of the vote with 1,689 votes total, has been officially recognized as the winner of the race. Ehlert participated in his first school board meeting in January. Both he and Breanne Dedrickson were sworn in earlier this year.
The holdup in the certification of results for board Seat E came in the form of a lawsuit by Stone, who claimed that Joey Granger, the Wasatch County clerk, acted illegally in disqualifying him from the race. Stone’s disqualification was the result of a clerical issue, and Granger notified Stone of his standing one week after Election Day.
Randall Lund, who was vying for school board Seat F, was disqualified for the same issue. But, Lund, who was running against Kim Dickerson — then the board vice president — had only secured 1,236 votes. Dickerson was ahead in the race for Seat F with 48% of the votes by Election Day.
A 4th District Court judge later ruled that Granger had, in fact, followed the law when she disqualified Stone from the race.
Stone’s disqualification meant that ballots in his favor would not be counted. Ehlert, who had trailed Stone in the race, was sworn in as a school board member in January.
The county council motion to certify Ehlert as the winning candidate was passed quickly and unanimously Wednesday.
Ahead of Election Day, Ehlert said that he wanted to serve on the school board to ensure that decisions made by the board would “genuinely reflect what’s best for our students and families.”
Ehlert, who has one child in high school and one in middle school in Wasatch County, said that affecting his own kid’s experience in a positive way was part of why he wanted to run for the school board.
“That was a big driver for me to find a way to affect my own kid’s outcome, hopefully, and their experiences,” Ehlert said. “I feel like a broken record when I say this, but very sincerely my goals with being on the school board is to help give people a voice.”
He said that, moving forward, his focus will be on “reviewing policies and procedures and hoping that we can put those in place that help protect the students as much as possible.” Ehlert added that, for him, bullying is a concern.
“That is something that I want to focus on and is at the forefront,” Ehlert said. “They can’t learn if they feel unsafe in their schools.”
Ehlert said that while the race was “not necessarily the way I wanted it to happen,” he is glad to have a seat on the board.