A razor-thin Winnebago County Board race to represent District 16 has flipped since Election Day and been decided by 13 votes as mail-in and provisional ballots were counted.
Christina Valdez, the Democrat, got 3,841 votes, or 50.1%, to overtake and defeat Frank Pobjecky, a Republican, who received 3,828 votes, or 49.9%, according to election results released on Tuesday.
Valdez who works as the finance officer for Rockford Area Arts Council and Pobjecky, a U.S. Army veteran and Winnebago County Sheriff’s deputy were competing to succeed Jean Crosby who did not seek re-election.
Valdez will represent District 16, an area that includes most of northeast Rockford.
The election tally had grown closer since the Nov. 5 election when Pobjecky had a 60-vote lead. As authorities in Rockford added mail-in ballots that hadn’t been counted on Election Day to the total, that lead narrowed to 18.
On Tuesday, election authorities in Rockford and Winnebago County tallied the final valid mail-in and provisional ballots before certifying the vote.