One day after the historic election of Adams County’s first black sheriff since Reconstruction and its first female chancery clerk, the halls of the courthouse were unusually quiet.

“We had expected to be met with a crowd,” Adams County Deocratic Executive Board Chairperson Frances Bailey said Wednesday afternoon.

Bailey and other representatives from the Democratic and Republican parties were inspecting and certifying absentee ballots from Tuesday’s primary runoff.

The day after election, candidates and their representatives usually keep a close eye on the counting of absentee ballots, especially in close races that could possibly be affected.

This year, party representatives had the first-floor hallway to themselves.

“It has been very quiet,” Bailey said.

In the primary runoff, 456 absentee ballots were cast, which put victory out of reach for most of the candidates who lost Tuesday.

Sheriff-elect Travis Patten won by 1,113 votes and Brandi Lewis won the chancery clerks race by 458 votes.

The closest race of the night was the District 5 supervisor’s runoff in which Calvin Butler unofficially beat Spanky Felter by 96 votes. Only 81 absentee ballots were cast for the runoff in District 5.

Even with additional certified affidavit votes, it is highly unlikely that any of the challengers could garner enough votes to win, Election Commissioner Larry Gardner said Wednesday evening.

“The chance of any one person getting all of the (absentee votes) is little to none,” Gardner said. “The spread usually follows the election.”

Gardner said Tuesday’s election went smoothly with no real hiccups. Similar to the last election, Gardner said precincts accepted a sizable number of affidavit votes.

“Like the last election, we had a lot people that were not registered,” Gardner said.

People who did not bring a picture ID also cast affidavit votes, he said. Those people have five business days to bring their identification to the circuit clerk’s office to have their vote count, Gardner said.

Until the voter ID affidavit ballots are certified, Gardner said the election cannot be certified, which he expects will not be until later next week.