LISBON — The East Palestine school district’s .5% earned income tax levy became the only renewal to lose Tuesday night in Columbiana County, according to unofficial but complete results from the county Board of Elections.

The margin was 55.92% against the tax and 44.08% in favor. East Palestine school district voters cast 718 votes against the income tax and 566 votes for the income tax which was seeking renewal for another five years.

When the income tax originally passed in March 2020, it was only by 10 votes.

All the other renewal issues passed, many by wide margins, including the Columbiana County Mental Health levy, the Columbiana County Senior Citizens Services levy, road levies in Butler, Center, Elkrun, Franklin, Hanover, Madison, Middleton, Salem, Unity, West, Washington and Yellow Creek townships, fire levies in Center, Madison, Salem and Unity townships and Wellsville, school levies in Salem and Leetonia, a library levy and parks levy in East Liverpool, a police levy in Perry Township, a parks levy in Summitville and a current expenses levy in Wellsville.

Local liquor options being sought all passed, including: Garwood Arena LLC in the Fairfield Township Center precinct, one for Monday through Saturday sales and one for Sunday sales; Rockbar LLC doing business as The Foundry in the Salem 2A precinct, Sunday sales; Loyal Order of Moose Lodge 467, East Palestine, 2 precinct, Sunday sales; and Loyal Order of Moose Lodge 112, East Liverpool, 3B precinct, Sunday sales.

Voter turnout ended up higher than expected at 28.46%, with 18,157 ballots cast. Columbiana County Board of Elections Director Kim Fusco said she was surprised. She had predicted 20% to 25%. She said everything was great on Election Day.

The only issue that came up was posting the results online in light of having to hide the results for Columbiana school board candidate Nicholas Clemmer as the votes were tallied. Fusco explained that per a directive from the Ohio Secretary of State’s Office, the results could not be posted until they had all seven of the precincts for the school board race in and the board certified the unofficial results.

Normally, the results are posted as they’re tallied with some of the precincts completed until they get to the final with all 73 precincts reported.

“I’m glad the results came back as quickly as they did, so we could let the public know,” Fusco said.

The results are now available on the board of elections website at columbiana.boe.ohio.gov and were not posted until sometime after 10 p.m. Tuesday.

Board of Elections Deputy Director Niki Wilkinson reported that there were 66 provisional ballots that will have to be checked over the next 10 days. The board scheduled the meeting to deal with the provisionals at 3:30 p.m. Nov. 17. The meeting to certify the official results was set for 1:30 p.m. Nov. 25.