Incumbent Mark Scott won reelection to an at-large seat on the Corpus Christi City Council, but the race for the other two at-large seats is headed to a runoff, according to complete, unofficial results.
Scott led the field with 26,000 votes, or 16.18% of all votes cast in the at-large race. He was the only candidate to reach the 12% threshold the city charter requires to win an at-large seat outright.
Incumbent Carolyn Vaughn, Merida Nardone Mendoza and Michael Miller will compete in the runoff for the two remaining seats.
How the at-large race works
Corpus Christi voters could choose up to three candidates for the three at-large seats. Under the city charter, a candidate must receive at least 12% of all votes cast in the at-large race to win.
Voters cast 160,733 votes in the race. That puts the threshold at about 19,300 votes.
When only one candidate clears that bar, the charter sends the next three highest vote-getters to a runoff.
Who finished where
Vaughn finished second with 18,457 votes, or 11.48%. Mendoza was third with 17,806 votes, or 11.08%. Both fell short of the threshold by fewer than 1,500 votes.
Miller claimed the final runoff spot with 15,385 votes, or 9.57%. Scott F. Corliss finished fifth with 15,116 votes, or 9.4%, just 269 votes behind Miller.
Nancy Vera finished sixth with 14,334 votes, or 8.92%. No other candidate received more than about 6% of the vote.
The at-large runoff joins other Corpus Christi council races, including Mayor and Districts 1 to 5, that are also headed to runoffs.
