Allison Pickard is facing Dave Crawford in the race to succeed Steuart Pittman as Anne Arundel County executive, with the outcome still unsettled as votes continue to be counted. A Pickard victory would keep Democrats in the county executive office for a third consecutive term.
That race matters now because the next county executive will have to deal with two of the county’s hardest issues: the housing crisis and the question of whether data centers should be allowed in Anne Arundel County. The result is being tallied by Maryland’s State Board of Elections, and what is shown now is preliminary and can still change as more votes are counted and recounted.
The executive race is only part of the picture. Democrats in Anne Arundel are also trying to build a 5-to-3 supermajority in the County Council by flipping a seat held by Amanda Fiedler, a goal that would give them more leverage as the county debates housing, labor rules and land use. One of the people trying to make that happen is Natalie Ogilvie, who is hoping to upset Fiedler in a district that is now evenly split between registered Republicans and Democrats.
That balance gives the fight added weight. A county that is closely divided on paper can still swing the way it is governed, and this year’s races would affect whether all employee unions in county government may be allowed to enter binding arbitration, whether the County Council can appoint officers without charter-defined titles and whether major changes go forward for the Planning Advisory Board. For now, the real answer is not in the projections but in the count.
By the time the final totals are settled, the headline here will be less about who started with the advantage and more about who gets the power to shape the next round of county decisions. Until then, Anne Arundel County Election Results remain open, and the last word belongs to the ballots still being processed.
