Orange County voters on Tuesday slimly voted to extend half-cent sales tax Measure M for transportation projects, while Newport Beach voters resoundingly rejected tightening the city’s slow-growth law.
Measure M, which needed a two-thirds majority to pass, got a narrow win with a 68.5% yes vote. The measure extends the half-cent sales tax by 30 years, starting in 2011.
Newport Beach voters did an about-face by rejecting Measure X, known as Greenlight II, by a resounding 62%.
The original Greenlight passed in 2000 with about the same percentage of the vote.
The measure would have expanded Greenlight to more projects, including possibly to home renovations and smaller redevelopments.
The original Greenlight requires public votes on major projects in the city. Three projects that have come before voters since then have been shot down.
In other races across the county, Anaheim Mayor Curt Pringle and Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido easily won re-election.
Costa Mesa Mayor Allan Mansoor, who’s pushed for the city to enforce federal immigration laws, also appears to have gotten the most votes of anyone running for the City Council.
Pat Bates won South County’s seat on the Board of Supervisors after a fierce, costly campaign against Republican rival Cassie DeYoung.
The county’s incumbent state Senate and Assembly members won re-election, though the race between Republican Lynn Daucher and Democrat Lou Correa is too close to call with Daucher leading by 13 votes.
