NEW HANOVER COUNTY — Two elected officials have announced a campaign for two seats opening on the county commissioners board, but if they win, it means they’ll have to exit their current elected positions. The announcements came as a surprise to many, including the New Hanover County Democratic Party.
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Wilmington City Council member Salette Andrews and New Hanover County Board of Education member Judy Justice announced Oct. 10 they filed intentions to run for New Hanover County commissioner. Should both Andrews and Justice win the seats, there would be two gaps to fill with local elected positions far earlier than anticipated.
Dr. LeShonda Wallace, founder of nonprofit Seeds of Healing and former chair of the county’s Health and Human Services Board, has also filed an intent to run, bringing the total Democratic candidates so far to four.
Two seats are on the ballot for the 2026 New Hanover County commissioners’ race, with incumbents, Democrat Rob Zapple and Republican LeAnn Pierce, both seeking re-election. Thus, the March primary election will need to determine who is on the official midterm ballot.
Filing for candidacy officially begins Dec. 1 and ends on the 19. Wallace announced her intent to run for the open seat on Oct. 9, and both Andrews and Justice followed suit on Oct. 10.
Andrews and Justice cited different reasons for filing early. Justice said she had surgery scheduled for Oct. 15, which would leave her in recovery for over a month. For Andrews, she said her team couldn’t rebrand their website or order campaign literature, due to campaign finance laws.
“You can’t do anything, you can’t order business cards; you can’t do anything until you file the committee,” Andrews said.
Jill Hopman, chair of the New Hanover County Democratic Party, explained as per the state party’s plan of organization, they do not endorse candidates for the primary.
She added she knew Justice was filing because the two had spoken about it prior to the submission, though Andrews came more as a surprise. Hopman noted the party’s county officers thought they found a strong team in Wallace and Commissioner Zapple, who could appeal to different voters.
Andrews, however, did not tell the New Hanover County Democratic Party that she was going to run for the county commissioner seat.
“They’re not involved in primaries, so there’s nothing that the party can really do for me in a primary,” Andrews said.
The council member is two years into her term after being elected to the Wilmington City Council in 2023.
“This isn’t really abandoning that role,” Andrews clarified. “This is moving forward. We really do need to bring the city and the county together, and I feel like that’s something that I could do.”
Andrews pointed to concerns over the New Hanover County commissioners’ $36-million budget cut this year, voted in by the board’s Republican majority — Bill Rivenbark, LeAnn Pierce and Dane Scalise. She also criticized the county backing out of the Workforce Housing Advisory Committee and homelessness strategy developed in 2024, both joint ventures with the city.
“It puts a lot of burden on the city to take up the slack,” Andrews said. “Frankly, the city’s had to take up the slack from what I call a trifecta of defunding from the federal, state and county level, and the city just can’t do it.”
In August, Andrews directed the city manager to put together a proposal for the city to implement the homelessness strategy, which fell by the wayside when the county pulled out in early 2025. However, other members of council, including Mayor Bill Saffo, said they believed a large task like that, both logistically and financially, could not be handled without county support and said he would like to see them come back to the table.
Hopman expressed some concerns over how Andrews’ seat would be filled, should she win. Unlike the New Hanover County commissioners or board of education, the Democratic Party isn’t responsible for picking a city council replacement. City council races are nonpartisan — though, Hopman said she wasn’t worried about the seat being filled by a Republican, as most of the council is affiliated with the Democratic Party.
While Andrews’ seat isn’t up this municipal election season, three council and the mayoral seats on the seven-member board will be decided this November. Incumbents Luke Waddell (R) and Clifford Barnett Sr. (D) are running again — Charlie Rivenbark (R) is not. The two sitting council members face off against challengers Richard Collier (R), JC Lyle (D), Kelly Roberts (R), Cassidy Santaguida (D), and Chakema Clinton-Quintana (D). Mayoral candidates include incumbent Democrat Bill Saffo, former county commissioner Jonathan Barfield (D) and former law enforcement officer Billy Craig (R).
Andrews’ seat would be up in 2027. A city council member leaving mid-term for another elected position has happened once before, according to Hopman.
“In 2008 there were over 30 applicants for a vacancy on city council,” she said. “All of the applicants get to give a little pitch and then the council votes. And although we might have a Democratic majority right now, I don’t think any elected office in an ideal sense should be left up to seven voters.”
The Democratic Party would choose who would be Justice’s replacement on the board of education, interviewing viable candidates. Then a committee made up of NHC Democratic Party officers, all precinct chairs and vice chairs, elected officials, the State Executive Committee, and all affiliated organization presidents (including LGBTQ+ Democrats, the African-American Caucus) vote for the replacement.
This has been done more recently, in 2020, when current New Hanover County Commission Chair Bill Rivenbark was a school board member and decided to run for a county seat. After he won, Pete Wildeboer was appointed by the GOP to serve out Rivenbark’s school board term.
Justice served on the board with Rivenbark back then, as she was first elected from 2018-2022. She lost her seat, but was re-elected in 2024, with her current term ending in 2028. If Justice won, the Democratic Party would choose her school board replacement and a committee of over a hundred Democratic Party members would vote on it.
According to Justice, her desire to run for commissioner also came down to budget cuts this year, which she said impacted two major areas that hit close to home for her: public education and mental health.
During her 2024 election campaign for the board of education, Justice’s daughter died after a battle with mental health. Justice criticized Novant, which purchased the county-owned New Hanover Regional Medical Center in 2021, for not doing enough to prevent her death.
Of the actions executed by the commission, Justice has had qualms with the hospital sale and the transfer of the public facility to a private entity. Upon the county commissioners $1.5-billion sale, they put almost $1.3-billion into the creation of the New Hanover Community Endowment. Justice said, should she win, she would like to meet with The Endowment staff and board members to discuss utilizing those funds more for mental health services and the public schools.
“I’m going to learn every darn thing I possibly can to find out how we can leverage it to the advantage of all the citizens of New Hanover County, not just a select few that appear to be benefiting right now,” Justice said.
Hopman said she was happy voters would have a plethora of options with four Democrats already announcing their run next year for the county commission.
“I think Rob Zapple works harder than anybody in local government,” Hopman said. “And I really think that we will have a fabulous woman to run with him.”
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