Redmond City Council member David Carson said Tuesday evening he is looking forward to continuing to help the city become more transparent and accountable to residents.
"It's obvious in the last four years that there's been a big transformation in the City of Redmond, and I'm happy to be a part of that," he said.
Carson is leading challenger Sue Stewart by 12 percentage points in his bid to serve a second term in Seat 7 on the Redmond City Council, according to the most recent elections results from King County.
Results released by King County Elections on Wednesday evening show Carson leading Stewart 56 to 44 percent with 7,942 ballots counted out of 26,035 registered city voters. Turnout in King County was projected to be around 52 percent for this election.
With Carson's apparent victory, the Redmond City Council will have only one new member next year. Two of the four open seats on the council were won unopposed in this electionl; Tom Flynn is leading in the race for retiring council member Richard Cole's seat.
, 45, works as a software engineer for Sogeti and has served on the city council since 2008. During his campaign, Carson said his top three priorities if re-elected would be public safety, the city's business community and providing funds for Redmond's road and utility infrastructure.
Challenger , meanwhile, stressed the need for alternative transportation during her campaign and said her other top priorities if elected would be managing growth and engaging the community in the government process.
Stewart did not return a call Tuesday evening seeking comment on the early results.
While celebrating Tuesday evening at in Redmond, Carson said making the city more hospitable to local businesses was going to be a primary focus of his second term.
"I don't want you to be afraid to come to city hall to do business," said Carson, who had won the endorsement of the Eastside Business Alliance.
Mayor John Marchione, who did not endorse a candidate in the Seat 7 race, said he was satisfied with the outcome but also stressed the difficulty of upsetting an incumbent candidate.
"I was going to be pleased with whoever won," Marchione said. "David (Carson) had the power of incumbency with him."
Carson said he had aimed for a 60-40 victory margin but was happy with the outcome nonetheless.
"It's not a huge victory, personally, for me...but any margin of victory is still a victory," he said.
Editor's note: This story was updated on Wednesday evening to include the most recent election results. The standings of this race remained nearly unchanged, with Sue Stewart's portion of the votes increasing from 43 to 44 percent. David Carson's percentage remained at 56 percent.
