Dinnel advances in commissioner race

    Chase County will have a new county commissioner from District 1 beginning in 2021.
    Republican challenger Duane Dinnel defeated three-term incumbent Chuck Vette and challenger Terry Bilka in Tuesday’s primary.
    Dinnel garnered 147 votes to Vette’s 125. Bilka earned 79 votes.
    Dinnel will advance to the General Election in November where he will face Democrat Dave Teply for the seat. Teply ran unopposed on the Democratic ticket so automatically advanced to November.
73% vote by early ballot.
    This year’s Primary was conducted under much different conditions due to the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak.
    Of the 1,172 voters parti-cipating in Tuesday’s primary, 856 cast their votes on early ballots rather than going to the polls. That equates to 73% of all voters casting ballots.
    In the 2018 Primary, only 136 voters used early ballots.
    With a high percentage of voters using early ballots, it ushed the voter turnout in Chase County to 47.8%.
    In the last presidential election Primary in 2016, Chase County recorded a 31.7% voter turnout.
    In contrast, the 2018 Primary, which included most of the county official elections and Imperial mayoral race, turnout hit 42.5%, which was still lower than this year.
    After the outbreak, voters were encouraged to use early ballots if they had any misgivings about going to polling sites on Election Day.