Mike Musick and Shandale Terrell will face off May 4 in a runoff for a seat on the Lakeland City Commission since none of the four candidates received a majority in today’s election. Terrell led with 39.74% of the vote to Musick’s 33.65%. Among the other candidates, Steve Frankenberger received 20.94% of the vote and Ken Post got 5.67%.
(Wednesday morning update: The Polk elections website says that early votes have not been counted, but Supervisor of Elections Lori Edwards said early voting is included in vote-by-mail totals, so total votes are correct. Her staff is working on updating the website to end the confusion.)
Terrell, an educator, focused on deep community roots and civic participation in his campaign, and Musick, who owns a roofing company, positioned himself as a conservative small business owner concerned about government transparency.
The ultimate winner will represent southeast Lakeland on the City Commission until the end of the year, filling out the rest of the term of Scott Franklin, who resigned from the commission in connection with his successful run for the U.S. House of Representatives.
Turnout was light in today’s nonpartisan special election. The 9,394 votes cast represent roughly 13.6% of Lakeland’s registered voters. No other elections or issues were on today’s Lakeland ballot, although elections were held in some other cities in Polk County.
Turnout was 12.01% the last time a single-race City Commission election was held in Lakeland; that was Jan. 15, 2019, when Sara Roberts McCarley captured 74.2% of the vote in a three-way race for a seat representing southwest Lakeland.
Because this is a short-term seat, another election will be held in November for a full four-year term for the seat. That election will also include races for mayor and two other commission seats.
Despite a short 6 1/2-week campaign season, the four candidates met in several live-streamed candidate forums — check video in our voter guide — and maintained a respectful, cordial tone despite disagreements on issues.
Don Selvage, who has been filling in as interim commissioner since January, will remain a member of the seven-member commission until after the May runoff.
Terrell missed making the runoff when he ran for an at-large seat on the City Commission in 2019. He received 18.77% of the vote in a four-way race that ultimately resulted in Chad McLeod being elected to the commission following a runoff against Carole Philipson. Terrell previously had run for Florida House of Representatives twice.
This is Musick’s first run for public office.
When candidates submitted campaign finance reports on Friday, Terrell led in the number of donors — 107 — but came in third in total dollars raised — $11,787.
Musick raised $13,191 — second to Frankenberger’s $16,855. He had 44 donations, second in number to Terrell.
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I really thought that Mr. Frankenberger had the most cohesive message.
Mr. Music is way too libertarian and refuses even take advice from the health experts about masks wearing. That’s a dangerous view. If you don’t trust the health experts will you trust others, like city staff, who may disagree with your opinion? It appears that he may not.
While I’m not a big fan or Mr. Shandell, I believe he is the best of the two less-qualified candidates. Remember the bad choice of libertarian Mr. Dunn? Please don’t make that mistake again.
Being “too libertarian” is negative for you it seems. I very much appreciate it. By the way, the guy”s name is M-u-s-i-c-k, for future reference.
To bring up a past City Commissioner’s decision / behavior and possibly think he would act the same is borderline idiotic. I don’t know any of the four that ran, but Mr. Musick seemed the most level headed.
Well Bob, I’m sorry that I erred in spelling his name but at least I know how to spell my name and did not “Jerry” it up. I guess I would only quote the line “Well, isn’t that special…”
Idiotic is a relative term meaning “insanely irresponsible”. If it’s borderline idiotic to suggest that a person who will not take the advice of health experts and someone who believes that they are above the law is the type of “level-headed” person to represent Lakeland then vote that way. Guess I view it differently.
I should not have have implied that he and other libertarians will act in a similar way but it’s fairly obvious that voters are not going for the libertarian approach of “I only do what I think is best for me an mine”. At least that’s what I see from those like Ron Paul. In my view, it’s a selfish approach. Remember we got here via “what is good for me ” Mr. Franklin who replaced the “what’s good for everybody” Mr. Selvage. Just don’t want to go backward. We will have a bill for probably $24,000 because Mr. Franklin chose to place his needs over those he said he would serve in Lakeland. Sounds libertarian to me but I’m a borderline idiotic I guess.
My intent was to start a conversation. My main point was that if you don’t believe the experts because it may conflict with your view will you take the advice of those we pay to guide the commission. I take that as a real negative possibility.
Don’t know if you missed it or not but I was pointing out what I consider a fault of a public person not a direct attack on a person who may not agree with your view.