Leventis, Zell set for runoff in District 8 city seat on Sumter school board

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Phil Leventis and Jeff Zell will battle in a runoff in two weeks after they were the two top vote-getters in the new District 8 race for Sumter school board on Tuesday.  

According to unofficial election-night totals, Leventis earned 40.22% of the new district’s vote, or 1,332 votes. Zell took 30.98%, or 1,026 votes.

Votes will be made official on Friday, according to the Sumter County Voter Registration and Elections Office, once failsafe votes are considered, though those are not often more than a handful. Absentee and early votes are already included in Tuesday’s totals.

The runoff election will be on Tuesday, Nov. 22.

Incumbent Sherril Ray earned 16.27% of the vote, or 539 votes, for third place.

Challenger Paul Robbins earned 11.81% of the vote for a fourth-place finish.

A former state senator representing Sumter for 32 years in the General Assembly, Leventis is looking to step back into the political arena with the school board seat.

Given a four-way race, he said he knew a runoff was a definite possibility.

“I was delighted with the response, but statistically with four people in the race, the chances of prevailing on the first ballot are small,” Leventis said. “We had a plan, we have a plan, and we are working on the plan, but we have a lot of work to do in the next two weeks.”

In a news release Tuesday night, Leventis said he reached out to Ray and Robbins and thanked them for running a positive and professional campaign and potentially looks forward to their input and ideas on how to move the school district forward.

Zell moved to Sumter and Shaw Air Force Base in 2017 and recently retired from the U.S. Air Force. Running for the school board is his first venture in politics.

He said it felt good to advance to a runoff and looks forward to a “sprint to the finish” during the next two weeks.

“We are not even going to take a breath, we are going to keep campaigning,” he said. “We owe it to ourselves and our supporters. I am thankful that the will of the people is being heard. We are going to sprint to the finish and will give our supporters our best foot forward.”

Incumbent Sherril Ray has served a four-year term on the board since 2018.