Bernalillo County primary races tighten, Olivas leads District 5, assessor too close to call

Bernalillo County voters left two of the county’s most watched primaries hanging on a narrow edge Tuesday night, even as County Commissioner Eric Olivas built a comfortable lead in District 5. The assessor race, by contrast, stayed so close that former County Clerk Linda Stover was only about two percentage points ahead of Damian Lara, underscoring how much county power can turn on a handful of votes.

Olivas’ advantage over Byron Powdrell pointed to a Democratic electorate that favored a candidate focused on public safety, behavioral health, roads and broadband, and the Metropolitan Detention Center. Powdrell had centered his campaign on East Mountains concerns, including wildfire risk, septic dependence, road access and slower emergency response, making District 5 a contest not just over one seat but over which part of the county would shape its priorities next.

District 5 stretches from Albuquerque neighborhoods into the East Mountains, a broad and geographically mixed area county materials describe as roughly 210,000 acres of rural, low-density communities. That split showed up in the campaign itself. Olivas pushed plans to expand the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office metro team, update behavioral health services, address declining well water tables, improve East Mountains roads and broadband, and push the county toward compliance in the McClendon jail-overcrowding case. Powdrell argued that the East Mountains faced chronic water and infrastructure pressure, making the seat a test of whether county government would devote more attention to that side of the district.

The Republican primary for the same District 5 seat also suggested a clear direction. Thomas Riley appeared on track to defeat Wayne Yevoli, and Riley said voters had trusted someone young to lead the future of District 5. Riley emphasized public safety, clean and abundant water, local jobs and resisting tax increases, while Yevoli stressed affordable housing, behavioral health, public safety and incentives to recruit more sheriff’s deputies. Together, the two primaries showed two different county coalitions taking shape around the same geographic divide.

The assessor race carried a different kind of weight. The office determines property values for tax purposes, which affects homeowners, businesses and county revenue, even though it does not set tax law or calculate bills. Stover’s campaign unfolded against past criticism over her move to a deputy treasurer job one day after leaving office, a hiring decision later found by a state district judge to have violated an in-house rule. With early voting and same-day registration underway ahead of the June 2 primary, and more than 21,000 absentee ballots requested by May 5, the tight margin in the assessor race showed a county still finely split over trust, tax administration and who should steer Bernalillo County’s next chapter.