REGINA - The count has resumed for Monday's provincial election as mail-in ballots get tabulated today.
While it won't impact the overall result which sees Scott Moe's Saskatchewan Party returned with a majority government, there is already an impact on the final standings as the Saskatchewan Party has gone down a seat since Election Night, now holding 34 seats to the NDP's 27.
The seat that has flipped since Election NIght is Saskatoon Westview, with April ChiefCalf of the NDP picking up enough mail-in ballots to overtake incumbent David Buckingham of the Saskatchewan Party. The final count has ChiefCalf with 3501, Buckingham 3464, and Jupiter Neault of the Green Party 137.
With the difference being only 37 votes the race seems unlikely to be decided until the final mail-in ballots are counted on Nov. 9, with a likely recount. Some 193 mail-in ballots that are due to arrive after Oct.26 are still to be counted in Saskatoon Westview, and Buckingham needs to hope the majority of those go his way at that Nov. 9 count in order to hold onto his seat.
Two other close results have ended up staying in the Sask Party column after Election Night.
One of those was in Prince Albert Northcote where the Saskatchewan Party's Alana Ross has won a second term following the completion of mail-in ballot counting. Final results have Ross with 2,841, Nicole Rancourt of the NDP 2,708, Terri Davis of Sask United 298, and Jarren Jones of the Green Party 100.
With only 125 mail-in ballots still to be counted on Nov. 9 the difference is too great for the NDP to catch up.
The other result is in Saskatoon Willowgrove. There, the Sask Party's Ken Cheveldayoff is holding on with 4,810 votes compared to 4,632 for Alana Wakula of the NDP. William Hughes of the Sask United party got 255 and Tawe Morin of the Green Party got 78.
While it seems unlikely Cheveldayoff can be caught at this point, there are still 427 outstanding mail-in ballots yet to be counted in Willowgrove. That count will happen Nov. 9.
Should the result hold up and if there is no further change in Westview, Cheveldayoff would be the only Sask Party MLA representing any urban seat in Saskatoon or Regina.
The votes being counted today are mail-in ballots received prior to Oct. 26. There are still outstanding mail-in ballots still to be tabulated as well as hospital and remand votes. Those will be counted in all ridings on Nov. 9, which is the date for the final count of votes.
