By LINDSAY PALMER
Three candidates, two parties, one gender – so far it looks like it will be a woman who takes office as the first Salt Lake County mayor next year.
Sandy Teck, Executive Director of Utah’s League of Women Voters, said she can’t remember a time when all of the candidates for a high elected position were female.
The female candidacy monopoly is a fairly recent and unique occurrence in Salt Lake County’s history.
Salt Lake County Elections Clerk Sherrie Swensen said that this is the fourth time that only women have run for Salt Lake County positions.
The other elections were in 1998 for County Commissioner and Recorder, and in 1994 for County Recorder. Those elections included all three current candidates for Salt Lake County mayor.
Swensen said that men still have a chance to get into the race.
“We won’t know until March 17 at 5 p.m., when filing is closed, who will be the candidates,” Swensen said.
Democrat Karen Crompton became the third candidate for the new position of Salt Lake County mayor Monday.
“Maybe none of the men in Salt Lake County are up to it,” Crompton joked.
Or perhaps the men just needed some time off.
“I decided that I’ve been in it for eight years, and I needed a break,” said Salt Lake County Commissioner Brent Overson, who dropped out of the county mayoral race last month.
“I think that there are three good candidates, and any one of them would do a fine job,” Overson said.
Crompton said she is running because she made a commitment to her supporters when she ran for Salt Lake County commissioner in 1998 and lost.
“On election night many people went to bed thinking I had won,” Crompton said of her loss to Republican Mary Callaghan, Salt Lake County Commission chair.
Callaghan is also running for the new mayoral position, against fellow Republican Nancy Workman, Salt Lake County recorder.
“I think it’s mere coincidence,” Workman said of the all-female mayoral candidacy. “I don’t see where one gender would be better than another.”
However, Workman said the Salt Lake County mayor must be able to work well with men, because the current city mayors and the council members up for office are predominately male.
Workman decided to run because she was concerned about balance in the new government, she said.
“I’m concerned that the mayor would be extremely powerful, and I’d like to make sure that the council retains its power,” Workman said.
