With the results not yet released, Democratic mayoral candidate Bob Dandoy gets a hug goodnight from his daughter, Jessica Matonak. Unofficial results as of press time have Dandoy winning over Republican Fred Reese and Independent candidate Tom Donaldson.

Bob Dandoy, a Democrat, is the new mayor of the city of Butler, having earned 888 votes against Republican candidate Fred Reese's 793 votes and independent candidate Tom Donaldson's 314 votes.

The complete, but unofficial, results from the Butler County Bureau of Elections show Dandoy with about 44% of the vote, Reese with about 39% of the vote and Donaldson with about 15%.

Dandoy said he will spend the coming days thanking people for their support before getting back to work with the city and council.

“I will be reaching out to all kinds of people to move the city forward,” Dandoy said. “I have a lot of people to call, a lot of people to thank, and really just hitting the ground running.”

Dandoy still has two years left on his term on city council, so the council will have to appoint a replacement to finish out his term.“My seat will vacate in January, and we'll have to figure out a process,” he said. “They have done it in different ways in the past.”Fred Reese was formerly on city council, and said he is pleased with how he ran his campaign. He said on Monday that he had wanted to serve Butler again in the capacity of mayor.“I would start getting everybody together again, find out who is head of each of the committees to work with them,” Reese said. “I don't think it would be too hard for me to get back into it.”Donaldson said he ran his campaign this year differently from his last campaign in 2016, not only because of COVID-19, but also in part because he was running on an independent ticket. Not being able to knock on doors was a change from his last race, but being independent was not a hinderance, he said.“You don't have the party funding, but you also don't have any favors to pay back,” Donaldson said.Dandoy said Monday he wants to get the right resources to all the city departments to bring Butler into the future.“I want to make sure fire, streets, police, parks, whatever departments are all equipped,” Dandoy said. “We'll make for better parks and better streets and, of course, a safer city with police and fire as we possibly can. I really think we are poised to bring the city into a great place.”

Accompanied by his sister, Butler mayoral candidate Bob Dandoy shakes hands with a voter outside of the polling station at Orchard Hill Church in South Butler Tuesday.