Voters in Allentown and Bethlehem have chosen new mayors. Democrat Matt Tuerk has easily defeated Tim Ramos and Solomon Tembo in the race for Allentown mayor. Tuerk earned 63-percent of the vote. In Bethlehem, Democrat William Reynolds also picked up 63-percent of the vote to turn aside Republican John Kachmar. After seven hours of reporting all precincts in and with Republican Glenn Eckhart winning the Lehigh County executive race, those numbers have flipped. It now looks like incumbent Phillips Armstrong has won re-election. In the latest numbers, as of 7:48 this morning, 161 precincts are still reported, but now Armstrong has a 2500 vote edge on Eckhart. In Northampton County, Democrat incumbent Lamont McClure defeated Republican Steve Lynch by 12 points to earn another term in office.
There were lots of so-called down-ballot races up for grabs Tuesday. There were five Lehigh County commissioners races on Tuesday, with Republicans Antonio Pineda, Ron Beitler and Jeffrey Dutt winning three of them. Democrats Zachary Borghi and Geoffrey Brace were winners in the other two. Likewise in Northampton County, voters chose five County Council members. Three Democrats, Tara Zrinski, Ron Heckman and Lori Heffner, who are all incumbents have apparently won, while it appears two Republicans, John Goffredo and John Brown were winners. However, that race is extremely tight. Allentown voters by a nearly two-to-one margin, turned down the idea of removing English as the city's official language.
Three Republicans have swept the race for Lehigh County Common Pleas Judge. Tom Caffrey, Tom Capehart and David Ritter all earned at least 4400 more votes than the three Democrats to win a seat on the bench.
It appears Republicans have swept all the statewide court races on Tuesday. In the contest for Supreme Court Justice, Republican Kevin Brobson defeated Maria McLaughlin by 135,000 votes. Megan Sullivan has won the race for Pennsylvania Superior Court by nearly 300,000 votes over Timika Lane and it looks like two Republicans have won a seat on Commonwealth Court. Stacy Wallace and Drew Compton appear to have both outlasted Democrats Lori Dumas and David Spurgeon.
Gas prices are stable in Pennsylvania, holding steading at $3.57 a gallon in Pennsylvania. While that price didn't go higher, it is still $1.12 a gallon more than one year ago. In the Lehigh Valley, the average price essentially stayed flat from one week ago at $3.53 per gallon. That's $1.13 more than on November 2nd of last year.
The U.S. Coast Guard has suspended its search for a plane that went missing on a flight from Reading to Massachusetts. The Piper PA-28 took off from Reading Regional Airport in Bern Township on Sunday. It was due to land at Chatham Municipal Airport in Massachusetts, but it never arrived. The aircraft's last transmitted transponder signal was at 6:49 Sunday night, descending at 4,000 feet per minute. The Coast Guard said its crews searched more than 2,076 square miles of water off the coast over the course of 55 hours and found no sign of the missing pilot or plane.