Gerry Taft has handily won a second term as District of Invermere Mayor.

Taft beat challenger Al Miller, a first-term district councillor, by a margin on 717-389.

The returning mayor will be one of only two members of the previous council to return to the table. He’ll be joined by incumbent councillor Spring Hawes, but the other three councillors are all newcomers to the district’s political scene: Justin Atterbury, Paul Denchuk and Greg Anderson. Anderson, a former SD6 trustee, is the only new member with previous civic government experience.

Hawes, one of only two female candidates in the 10-person slate, led the pack with 571 votes. Atterbury picked up 559, Anderson 556 and Denchuk 528.

The next closest candidate to the pack was Dale Wilker, who picked up 512 votes.

We’ll have more election analysis over the coming days, so keep checking invermerevalleyecho.com.