New state and congressional districts do not shake up politics in local elections for State Assembly and U.S. Congress.

Among the more unusual races in the county this June was for the newly drawn state Assembly District 30, which stretches from part of Santa Cruz County, down the coast of Monterey County and into San Luis Obispo County.

The assemblymember who long represented the Monterey Peninsula is Mark Stone, D-Scotts Valley, but when the new district maps were approved last December, Scotts Valley was out, and parts of San Luis Obispo County were in. Also edged out on the Big Sur coast was Robert Rivas, whose District 29 moved inland.

Initial reporting of results in all three counties showed Dawn Addis, a city councilmember in Morro Bay, with a sizable lead of 44.7 percent of the nearly 60,000 votes counted. Second was Vicki Nohrden – who is based in Carmel, and is the only Republican in the five-candidate race – with 31.9 percent of the vote. In a distant third was Seaside city councilmember Jon Wizard, with 10.7 percent of the vote.

Before the first results came in, Wizard’s election night party at The Oven on Broadway in Seaside was abuzz with good vibes.

Even after the initial results were announced, the mood was ebullient. When asked about his place in the race, Wizard said he was hoping for a better result as ballots were counted, adding, “It’s not done by any stretch, but we still have some catching up to do.”

Earlier in the day, Addis said one thing that struck her while campaigning was how much the regions in the new district have in common in terms of the issues they face, water scarcity among them.

While it seems clear Nohrden will be in a runoff in November against Addis, it’s not clear it will be much of a race: More than 68 percent of the initial votes counted went for Democratic candidates for the seat.

A cohort of real estate and agricultural interests called Fighting for Our Future spent at least $377,700 supporting another candidate – Zoë Carter of Monterey – and $135,700 opposing Addis. Despite those massive expenditures, initial reports show Carter garnering only 8.6 percent of the vote.

Similarly, the race to represent much of Monterey County in the U.S. Congress in the newly drawn District 19 that cut out much of the Salinas Valley – which got lumped in with the electorate of primarily San Jose voters – incumbent Jimmy Panetta, D-Carmel Valley, is sailing toward victory, with 68 percent of the vote.

That notwithstanding, one of his Republican challengers, Dalila Epperson, who garnered just 6 percent of initial votes tallied, said at her June 7 election night party at the Monterey Tides hotel, after the first results came in, “I still think we’ve got this.”

Republican Jeff Gorman appears to be headed to a November runoff against Panetta.

In District 18, incumbent Zoe Lofgren, D-San Jose, was leading with 57.5 percent of the vote in her bid for a redrawn district that now includes much of Monterey County, and appears to be headed to a runoff against Republican Peter Hernandez.