By ALEC ETHEREDGE | Staff Writer

CHELSEA – There will be a runoff between two mayoral candidates in Chelsea after residents spent Tuesday, Aug. 23 casting their vote for a new mayor.

Dale Neuendorf and Tony Picklesimer will face off against each other in a runoff election that is scheduled for Tuesday, Oct. 4, 2016 to determine who will be the second mayor in Chelsea’s history.

“I look forward to the opportunity for the runoff election, to earn that position of mayor and demonstrate to the people that we can build Chelsea into the city we would like it to be,” Neuendorf said.

“This was not a surprise, the surprise was maybe the margin, but it wasn’t a surprise for us to be in a runoff,” Picklesimer said. “We were expecting this and will continue on to the Oct. 4 runoff.”

Picklesimer received 1100 votes, while Neuendorf gathered a total of 761 votes and Alison Nichols brought in 452 votes.

“Obviously our message has not reached all of the voters that we need to get that message to,” Neuendorf said. “We have a lot of work to do, but it’s not the end of the world.”

Picklesimer felt a little more confident in reaching the residents of Chelsea and said they are responding to his message.

“The citizens of Chelsea have responded to me and the fact that I am staying on issue and keeping my primary campaign platform, which is to keep our citizens safe and operate within our means,” Picklesimer said. “I stayed on topic in the initial campaign and I will stay on topic in this runoff as well and hopefully the people continue to respond to it.”

While they are both focused on preparing and figuring out how to reach new voters, each candidate said they want to see a better turnout come Oct. 4 than the 29 percent of citizens that showed up to vote in the original election.

“We’ve still got 71 percent of voters that didn’t show up to the poll,” Neundorf said. “Our new strategy will consist of not only persuading the 29 percent that did come out, but also figuring out how to get the other 71 percent out to vote six weeks from tonight.”

“I’ll continue to talk about how important of an election this actually is,” Picklesimer said. “Chelsea has had one mayor for 20 years so this election will be pivotal for our city. We will stay on message and show that it is important to get out and vote. We will work to get those 1100 voters back out to the pole, as well as add even more.”

Mayor Earl Niven is stepping down on the city’s 20^th anniversary and leaving Chelsea in the hands of a new mayor so each candidate said it is important that the people of Chelsea understand this is a huge time for Chelsea and residents need to be aware.