The incumbent sheriff received approximately 76% of the total vote. | Stock Photo
The incumbent sheriff received approximately 76% of the total vote. | Stock Photo
Dan Altena has been re-elected as Sioux County sheriff, according to nwiowa.com.
According to unofficial election results, the incumbent sheriff received 12,700 out of 16,688 ballots, winning approximately 76% of the total votes.
“I had a lot of people contact me and let me know their support, so it feels good,” Altena said.
Altena, a 61-year-old Republican from Sioux Center, ran unopposed on the ballot but faced a write-in challenge from Orange City’s Assistant Chief of Police Bruce Jacobsma.
The unofficial results showed 3,988 write-in votes were cast in the race which was about 24% of the total votes in the race, but did not show the number of write-in ballots for Jacobsma.
“The outcome isn’t what we wanted, but for only having about two and a half months in that short amount of time and the fact that it was a write-in, which is always an uphill battle anyway, I think the numbers that we got were pretty good,” Jacobsma said.
This will be Altena's fifth term as county sheriff.
“We have done a lot of work here to build a good organization in the last four terms, and obviously, there’s a lot going on right now with racial issues and the pandemic is still out there,” Altena said. “There’s a lot of things that are going on with increased violence and drugs and that kind of thing, so there’s a lot of work to be done.”
Alerts Sign-up