The final winners of the Palm Beach County School Board races are still undetermined after Tuesday night’s election, with no automatic winners in either race as no candidate received more than 50% of the vote.
As of Tuesday night, there was a slim margin between candidates Gloria Branch and Mindy Koch in the District 5 race. State law requires a recount when the margin is less than or equal to 0.5% of the total votes. The results of a recount could occur in the coming days, unless the candidate with the lesser votes — Branch, in this case — requests for the recount not to happen.
Either way, a recount would not change the outcome of Branch and Koch being the top two vote-getters, meaning they will compete in the Nov. 5. general election, as neither received more than 50% of the vote. They defeated candidates Charman Postel, Mike Letsky and Suzane Page in one of the counties most crowded races.
Branch, 56, is a more than 40-year Boca Raton resident and current substitute teacher with a desire to “shed the remnants of equity and woke ideology,” according to her Sun Sentinel questionnaire, and invest resources in teacher pay and the classroom.