A tight race for revenue commissioner highlighted Tuesday’s primary runoff election in Covington County, where George “Chuck” Patterson edged Meredith Peters with 52 percent of the vote.

Patterson tallied 2,341 votes to Peters’ 2,171 to win by 170 votes. Although Patterson trailed until results from his hometown of Opp gave him a lead he would not relinquish the remainder of the night, he was quick to thank all of Covington County for its support.

“All of the county supported me,” Patterson said. “I got to see a lot of people (during the campaign). I traveled this county at least four to five times. So all I would like to say is just thank you to my family and then to the Covington County voters, because we’ve got a wonderful county and we just need to all take it forward and do as much as we can for it.”

Patterson said he was not at all surprised by how tight the race stayed after he and Peters were separated by just 23 votes in the primary.

“I knew it was going to be close and it’s just fortunate that I came out on top,” he said. “I want to thank Meredith. It was very clean race and everyone tried the hardest they could. It’s just the voters of Covington County made the decision.”

Peters herself also expressed thanks for a clean race and for all of her supporters.

“I just want everybody to know how much I appreciate all of the support,” Peters said. “First of all with their prayers, the financial support and just the effort. We couldn’t have done all we were able to do without all of their support. I’m really humbled by their support. I’m disappointed for them. I feel like that I let them down in someway, but overall, it was a positive experience.”

Covington County Probate Judge Ben Bowden said it was also a positive experience on the voter-turnout end, as the numbers were higher than expected.

“I predicted 20 percent, and there was a 21 percent (4,532 of 22,090 registered voters) turnout,” Bowden said. “It’s low for what you would hope for, but it’s high for what the state prognosticators were saying, which was as low as 5 percent. Covington County residents showed they care about represents them.”

On the statewide level, voters in Covington County lent their support to John Merrill over Reeese McKinney for secretary of state. Merrill received 2,249 (60 percent) votes to McKinney’s 1,466. Jim Zeigler was chosen over Dale Peterson for state auditor with Zeigler receiving 2,188 (61 percent) votes to Peterson’s 1,371. Terry Dunn was chosen over Chrs “Chip” Beeker Jr. for public service commission Place 2 with Dunn receiving 2,004 (58 percent) votes to Beeker’s 1,467. County voters were also in favor of the statewide cotton amendment, with 2,847 (78 percent) votes in favor of the amendment and only 700 voting against it.