Two School Board Seats Are Still Undecided: Lee County's District 4 and District 5 Runoffs End Tuesday
Incumbents Debbie Jordan and Armor Persons both failed to clear 50 percent in August, so their seats go to runoffs on Tuesday — Jordan against Gartner manager Tony Beougher, and board chair Persons against district paraprofessional Crystal Johnson.
Two of the seven seats on the Lee County School Board will be decided on Tuesday, in runoffs that have been running since August. Neither incumbent won more than 50 percent of the vote in the primary, so both races moved to the November 3 general election ballot — and only voters who live in each district can vote in its race.
In District 4, which covers the northern parts of the school district, including parts of Cape Coral east of Del Prado Boulevard and parts of Fort Myers, incumbent Debbie Jordan, 68, is defending the seat she has held since 2018. Her challenger is Tony Beougher, 44, a business management professional with more than 20 years at Gartner, the technology consulting company with a major Lee County presence. The money told the primary story: fundraising reports put Beougher at about $63,555 to Jordan's roughly $24,566.
In District 5, which covers northeastern Lee County mostly north of State Road 82 — Alva, Lehigh Acres and Buckingham among its communities — the incumbent is Armor Persons, the school board's chair. He led the three-candidate primary with 43.38 percent of the vote, 7,337 ballots. His runoff opponent, Crystal Johnson, took 31.42 percent, 5,315 votes; Johnson is a paraprofessional in the district and a former parent involvement specialist, and all four of her children attended Lee County schools.
Both races are nonpartisan, and the winners will help set policy and rules for the district's administration for the next term. Polls are open Tuesday from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., and Election Day voters cast their ballots at their assigned precinct polling place.
