St. Paul is poised to have its first all-female city council with Cheniqua Johnson and Anika Bowie winning seats during the ranked-choice counting process Friday. Six of the council’s seven members are set to be women of color when new terms begin in January.

Results in Ward 1 and Ward 7 — where the winners weren’t clear on Tuesday night — came late Friday after more than 11 hours of recounting and reallocation of ballots. All that remains is a reallocation in Ward 3, where the second-place candidate already conceded the race to Saura Jost.

On Friday evening, Bowie, a Ward 1 candidate, gained the more than 50% of total votes cast to win. Bowie had a decisive lead on Tuesday’s election, but her 40% share of the vote did not put her past the 50% threshold to win outright.

Eight candidates competed to represent Ward 1, which incudes Frogtown, Summit-University and other surrounding neighborhoods.Ward 7

Earlier in the day, Johnson emerged as the winner in the race for the St. Paul City Council Ward 7 seat. She ended up with about 45% of total ballots cast after reallocation, which is below the 50% majority threshold, but permitted because of how the votes split.

Johnson, 28, will represent a district in southeastern St. Paul encompassing neighborhoods including Dayton’s Bluff, Mounds Park, Swede Hollow and Battle Creek. She’s the second Black woman to ever serve on the St. Paul City Council and the first in her ward.

Bowie and Johnson will join a slate of self-described progressive members on the council.

“It feels amazing to be able to have the rest of my community to be a part of this historic moment, but not just because it’s an all-women council, but because of our community and ward also deserve someone who reflects it,” said Johnson. “I look forward to being able to be the first person of color and the first black woman to represent our community in Ward 7.”

On election night it was already apparent St. Paul voters had elected five female candidates to the seven member council. But the outcome of two races were still up in the air Friday.

Counting ballots

St. Paul voters rank candidates by choice on their ballots. If one candidate gets a simple majority, they win. But if there’s no clear winner, elections officials will eliminate the candidate with the fewest first-choice votes and award votes to the second choice listed on the ballot. This process is repeated until one candidate has 50% support, or until one candidate reaches a plurality of votes through several rounds of elimination.

Organizers, candidates and interested members of the public gathered at the Ramsey County Elections office on the West Side as workers processed ballots in a process that got started around 8 a.m. and continued into the early evening. Nearly 10 hours into the process, paramedics responded for an election worker who had an apparent medical emergency, but the worker did not need immediate medical attention and was able to stay at the county office.

Recounting ballots alone took about six hours before elections workers could move on to the process of reallocating ballots.

St. Paul’s Ward 7 was the closer of the two races reallocated on Friday. Johnson led with 41% of the vote after the first round of voting Tuesday and was closely tailed by Pa Der Vang, who had 36%. Voters cast about 4,400 ballots for six candidates in that race.

After reallocation, Johnson had 1,986 and Vang had 1,852 of the 4,406 total ballots cast. It took officials about 7 hours to name a winner in Ward 7, and they then moved on to Ward 1.

Bowie had a much bigger lead than Johnson did on Tuesday, with 40% of the vote. She was followed by James Lo with 20%. There were 6,645 ballots cast in that race.

The reallocation process was ongoing Friday night, and final vote numbers not immediately available.

Incumbents re-elected

There were four open seats on St. Paul City Council in this year’s election. The three incumbent members running for reelection warded off challenges Tuesday night.

Rebecca Noecker, who faced three challengers, garnered 63% of the vote in Ward 2, which covers downtown St. Paul, the West Side and surrounding neighborhoods.

Mitra Jalali received 79% of the vote in Ward 4, which covers Hamline Midway, St. Anthony Park and parts of Macalester-Groveland and Como.

Nelsie Yang, who represents the East Side’s Ward 6, won with 61% of the vote.

Hwa Jeong Kim won in Ward 5, a district that covers Como, North End, Payne-Phalen and Railroad Island. She won with 52% of the vote.

Ward 3

Saura Jost prevailed in Ward 3 with 48% of the vote after the second-highest vote getting candidate Isaac Russell conceded the election late Tuesday. Ward 3 includes Highland Park and Macalester-Groveland.

However, Russell on Thursday requested a full ballot count and reallocation, even though he had conceded the election to Jost on election night.

Results won’t be official until the council certifies them next Wednesday.