Sacramento mayor's race heading to fall runoff

The Sacramento mayor’s race is officially headed to a fall runoff between top primary vote-getters Kevin Johnson and Heather Fargo.

After more than a week of counting absentee votes, the Sacramento County Registrar of Voters has posted an update on its Web site noting that neither incumbent Heather Fargo nor challenger Kevin Johnson received the mandatory 51 percent in the June 3 primary needed to avoid a November general election.

With all 378 precincts counted, Johnson, a former professional basketball player, won 30,929 votes, good for 46 percent. Fargo, a two-term incumbent, won 26,669 votes, good for 39 percent. Other candidates in the race, including Leonard Padilla, Shawn Eldredge, and Muriel Strand, accounted for the remaining votes.

The Johnson campaign, for its part, was quick to release a statement aiming to frame the debate in the coming months.

“We haven’t let up,” said Johnson, “I’ve been at community meetings nearly every night since the election. My priorities over the next five months are to continue to interact with, listen to residents and ensure we’re bringing best practices to Sacramento.”