Retail spirit licensees will be able to sell alcohol in Washington County on Sundays following the results from the Special County Election on Tuesday night.

Overall, 5,597 people (nearly 60-percent of voters) in the county voted in favor of the proposition. 396 of those voters voted absentee. 3,674 people (nearly 40-percent of voters) were not in favor of the proposition. 196 of those voters voted absentee.

A total of 9,467 people voted on the proposition. District One County Commissioner Mitch Antle said on a county-by-county look at the totals on Tuesday night, there were approximately 200 more votes on the proposition than there were for the Presidential Preferential Primary. He said that he found that to be unique.

Some elections are going to have larger turnouts than others. The State of Oklahoma requires counties to run propositions at certain times or at certain election. Commissioner Antle said this is to get the largest turnout of voters to the polls.

Apart from that, Commissioner Antle said the biggest thing he wants to continue to convey to the electorate is the fact that representative government (i.e. Washington County) relies heavily on votes for everything. He said they rely on this so they can fairly determine what the electorate wants. That helps Washington County be more effective in the job they are trying to do for you.

Commissioner Antle said the proposition Washington County ran was very specific and dealt with equity. He said you could go to a convenient store on a Sunday to purchase alcohol, but you could not go to a liquor store to purchase alcohol on Sunday.

That created inequity in the market in Washington County. Commissioner Antle said the County only wanted to see if the public wanted to address the issue or not. He said 60-percent of the public wanted to address the matter, while 40-percent did not.

Some retail spirit licensees have told Commissioner Antle that they will remain closed on Sunday regardless of whether or not the proposition passed. However, a majority of stores in the area said they were in favor of being open on Sunday. As a local official, Commissioner Antle said there has to be equity wherever they can get equity in the market. He said they do not want to favor one person over another.

Now, the option for those retail spirit licensees to stay open and sell alcohol, if they so choose, belongs to those stores.