New partial vote totals posted Monday and two candidate concessions have brought more clarity to two city of San Diego races on the March primary ballot. Henry Foster III appears to have won a San Diego City Council seat outright, and Coleen Cusack appears to have locked up the second slot in a November runoff against incumbent Stephen Whitburn for another council seat.
But Ferbert and Maienschein are both headed for a November runoff. That's because in all San Diego races except the special election for District 4, the top two finishers face off in November even if one candidate gets more than 50 percent of the vote in Tuesday’s primary. Foster will claim the seat outright next month because the city's automatic runoff rule, approved by city voters in 2016, doesn't apply to special elections.