OCALA, FL (352today.com) – Marion County voters will decide the open District 4 school board seat on November 3, 2026, when Mike Mills faces Brigitte Smith in a runoff.
Mills received 23,458 votes (36.86 percent) in the Aug. 18 primary. Smith received 19,631 votes (30.84 percent). Jeff Brewer finished third with 13,445 votes (21.12 percent) and Buddy Wyckoff fourth with 7,114 votes (11.18 percent). Neither of the top vote recipients reached the majority needed to win outright. Incumbent Nancy Thrower did not seek another term.
The nonpartisan race is voted on countywide. Mills, a U.S. Navy veteran and owner of Symmetry Coffee Company in Ocala, is a Take Stock in Children alumnus and mentor and an adjunct professor at the College of Central Florida. Smith is a registered nurse, U.S. Army Nursing Corps veteran, and chairwoman of the Marion County Republican Executive Committee. Her REC term ends in December. She has spent more than a decade in Tallahassee on parental-rights advocacy and volunteers as a medical missionary…