By AMALIA KORTRIGHT
Staff Writer
Wetumpka resident Michael Dozier was elected as Elmore County Circuit Clerk during the Republican primary runoff election on Tuesday, July 17, defeating incumbent Brian Justiss by more than 1,000 votes.
Dozier received a total of 5,379 votes and Justiss received 4,078 votes. Dozier will begin his six-year term in January 2019.
“I’m excited to serve the people of Elmore County,” Dozier said. “We’re just going to do what we have to do to be fully prepared for the day that we take office.”
Dozier referred to his campaign as “long and draining,” and said he is happy to have won after running for office for the first time.
“It’s a lot of hard work. We went door to door, not only for the primary, but also for the runoff. It’s not cheap for sure,” Dozier said.
As the son of former Elmore County Circuit Clerk Larry Dozier, who served in the office for 16 years, Dozier said his background is one of the things that prompted him to run.
“I grew up in the office,” Dozier said.
When making the decision to run, Dozier said he believed that he was capable of improving “the state of the office.”
“I felt like it was time for me to take a stand and try to bring the office back to where it once was and to do my part in serving the people,” Dozier said.
One of the problems facing Elmore County residents, Dozier said, was the lack of timely responses to phone calls made to the circuit clerk’s office. “That’s going to be the number one thing we try to fix, immediately,” Dozier said.
Justiss said he is glad to have served his six-year term as circuit clerk and is thankful for his time in office.
“I enjoyed representing and helping the people of Elmore County and providing the services I was elected to provide,” Justiss said.
Out of the 55,385 Elmore County residents who are registered to vote, a total of 10,479 cast their ballots. Elmore County’s overall voter turnout amounted to 18.92 percent, with 30 out of 31 precincts reporting. Provisional ballots will be counted at a later date.
