Voters in Senate District 15 will head back to the polls on Tuesday, Oct. 13 for a runoff election to decide who will succeed Senator Gary Jackson, who retired earlier this year.
District 15 covers a portion of Montgomery County which includes East Winona, Lodi, North Kilmichael, Kilmichael, Stewart, Nations and Poplar Creek precincts; a portion of Oktibbeha County; and all of Webster and Choctaw counties.
In the special election, Bart Williams, a business owner from Starkville, and Joyce Meek Yates, a former professor and director the Health Promotion and Wellness Program from Eupora, both pulled ahead of the four-candidate race for the seat. Williams took the lead with 2,942 votes while Yates had 2,442.
Williams led Oktibbeha, the biggest county of the four in the district with 1,460 votes and Choctaw with 624 votes. He trailed Yates in Webster and in Montgomery counties. In Webster, Williams had 812 votes and in Montgomery he had 67.
Yates won Webster County and she trailed in Montgomery, Choctaw and Oktibbeha counties. In Webster, she had 1,293 votes and in Montgomery, she had 135.
Between the four counties, there were 8,818 votes cast with the lowest number of votes cast in Montgomery County, with 434, and the highest in Oktibbeha County, with 3,905. There were 2,659 votes cast in Webster County and 1,816 cast in Choctaw County.
The winner between the two will serve the last three years of Jackson’s term.
Yates said she is thankful to everyone who came out and votes and hopes that people do the same during the runoff race.
“It was a decent turnout; we’re satisfied because we’re in the runoff. It was a clean campaign. I got to meet people and connect with old acquaintances. I was thrilled,” she said.
Williams said he wasn’t sure what he expected, but he expected Bricklee Miller to lead the ticket.
“It shocked me that she didn’t lead the ticket and that she wasn’t in the runoff,” he said.
However, he said he is excited to have moved on to the runoff.
Montgomery County had the lowest turnout of the four counties, and both candidates said they’ve been reaching out and making connections to get voters in the county to the polls.
Yates and Williams are similar. Both have 30 years of experience in District 15 in one capacity or another.
Yates, who is now retired, has worked in education for 30 years. She was a professor at the former Wood Junior College, Mississippi University for Women and Mississippi State University. Yates served as director of the Health, Promotion and Wellness program until she retired.
She said not only has she been a teacher, she has owned a dance studio and her husband owned a store in Eupora, she is encountered people from all over District 15 in one way or another.
Williams, originally from Memphis, Tenn., attend Mississippi State University and graduated in 1989. He began his career as an industrial engineer and then began Security Solutions.
Both said that after much prayer and talking to the people close to them, they decided to jump in the ring.
“The process intrigued me and when I heard that Senator Jackson was retiring, I did some searching, praying and I decided I wanted to do it,” Williams said.
Yates said she decided to run because she felt the Lord placed it on her heart, and it is something that she has wanted to do.
Williams said he’s committed and all in, and if he’s hired next week, he’s going to do the work that’s important to the people of District 15.
Yates said she wants to see a better economy, to see it turned around from the Coronavirus pandemic, better jobs, and an overall improvement to life in District 15.
