DETROIT (AP) – NBA Hall of Famer Dave Bing advanced Tuesday to a runoff election in May, when he will seek to serve out the remainder of disgraced former Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s second term.
The top two vote-getters advance to a May 5 runoff, and incumbent Ken Cockrel Jr. led former deputy mayor Freman Hendrix for the second slot.
With 99 percent of precincts reporting, Bing had 26,104 votes, Cockrel had 24,500 and Hendrix 21,036, followed by Wayne County Sheriff Warren Evans with 9,119 votes.
The four Democrats were among 15 candidates vying for the mayor’s job.
Only 9 percent of Detroit’s 626,000 registered voters cast ballots in the nonpartisan primary, city clerk Janice Winfrey estimated shortly after polls closed at 8 p.m.
Four hours earlier, retiree Charles Dunn said he was only the 108th person to vote at Henry Ford High School.
“It’s lousy,” said Dunn, 57. “It’s as if they don’t care.”
people had voted at her precinct when Claudia Seldon cast her ballot around noon at St. John’s Presbyterian Church on the city’s east side.
“I’m very upset that more people have not been here,” said Seldon, 62, a retired registered nurse. “I don’t think it hits people that this is as important as a regular election.”
The regularly scheduled primary is in August with the runoff in November. The winner in that campaign will serve a regular four-year term starting next January. The four elections will cost $6 million for the city, reeling under the auto industry’s difficulties and other problems.
Kilpatrick resigned in September as he pleaded to criminal charges in the scandal, which involved an affair with a top aide. Cockrel moved up from city council president.
If he is one of the two top vote-getters and goes on to win in May, Cockrel remains mayor through the end of the year. If he loses Tuesday, Cockrel will return to the city council and Detroit will get its third mayor in less than 10 months after the May runoff.
Cockrel and most of the other candidates lack the business sense that Detroit needs at this time, said Dunn, who voted for Bing, a former Detroit Pistons great and founder of the Bing Group, an automotive supplier.
d be coming into the city.”
Seldon said she voted for Cockrel “because I think he’s done a good job under hard times at the moment, and I think he needs more time.”
The once-popular Kilpatrick was released from jail earlier this month after serving 99 days of a 120-day sentence. He pleaded guilty in September to obstruction of justice and no contest to assault. He admitted he lied during a civil trial to cover up an affair with his chief of staff, with whom he exchanged sexually explicit text messages.
Despite Cockrel’s incumbency, no candidate dominated endorsements.
Cockrel was endorsed by a number of unions. Hendrix was endorsed by former Detroit Mayor Dennis Archer, while Bing was endorsed by The Detroit News. Evans was endorsed by the Detroit Free Press.
Vicinity endorsed both Cockrel and Evans. Some other pastors endorsed Hendrix.
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Associated Press Writer Ben Leubsdorf contributed to this report.
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