Retired Navy chief Rick Hannold secured the second slot for the commissioner District 3 election and pulled far enough ahead to avoid a recount.

Primary election results were certified Tuesday morning.

Democrat Karla Jacks took the majority of the votes in the commissioner race with 3,028. Hannold, a Republican, took the second general election spot with 946 votes, with interim Commissioner Aubrey Vaughan a close third with 896 votes —- a 50 vote margin.

Hannold said his strategy was mainly “door knocking” and meeting people in person. Moving forward, he plans to step up his campaign with advertising and finding more volunteers to help with his campaign.

“I’m looking forward to the challenges of the general election,” Hannold said.

A total of 233 ballots were rejected by the elections office for the primary due to late postage dates and other issues.

Commissioner Jill Johnson said Monday that with races this close, every vote needs to count.

Vaughan, appointed to the District 3 position in May, said he it is unfortunate that so many votes had to be rejected.

“Yes, I’m disappointed that those votes weren’t counted,” Vaughan said Tuesday. “But would they have swung the election one way or the other? We’ll never know.”

Only voters within District 3 cast ballots for the commissioner primary, but the winner will be decided in the general election through a county-wide vote.

The race for county treasurer is even closer.

Democratic incumbent Ana Maria Nunez took the majority of votes with 7,847, but the other two candidates were still within 11 votes of each other at certification.

A manual recount is required by statute in a race this close and will begin Monday morning.

Republicans Wanda Grone and Christa Canell took 4,754 and 4,743, respectively.

In the county auditor race, incumbent Sheilah Crider took 9,287 to Rebecca Wagner’s 6,955 votes.

Incumbents for county prosecutor, sheriff, coroner, county clerk and assessor all ran unopposed.