In Bulloch County, the State Court judgeship, three seats on the Board of Commissioners and four seats on the Board of Education are up for election at the local level this year. Candidates need to qualify March 2-6 to appear on a ballot for the May 19 party primaries and nonpartisan general election.
It is a gubernatorial election year, so all of Georgia’s elected state executive posts with four-year terms, from governor and lieutenant governor to state school superintendent, are up for election. So are all seats in the Georgia House of Representatives and Senate, as well as the U.S. House and one of Georgia’s U.S. Senate seats. Those candidates generally qualify in Atlanta.
But 2026 is a midterm year at the county level, where officials qualify locally. The full hours for qualifying are 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday, March 2 through Thursday, March 5, and then 9 a.m.-noon Friday, March 6, with noon that Friday being the statewide deadline.
Where to qualify
In Bulloch County, exactly where candidates qualify depends on whether they are seeking a partisan office or a nonpartisan office.
Only candidates for nonpartisan offices – in 2026 only those for State Court judge and Board of Education – will complete their paperwork and pay their candidate fees directly with the Board of Elections and Registration office at the County Annex, 113 North Main St., Suite 201, where Elections Supervisor Shontay Jones is in charge.
But the county commissioners identify with political parties – all are currently Democrats or Republicans – and candidates for these seats qualify with the local party committees.
“Our office, specifically, we do all the qualifying for nonpartisan seats, so that’s my only qualifying group, anybody that is nonpartisan,” Jones said last week. “When I came aboard the decision was made that the local parties will qualify their own candidates that are, you know, declaring for a particular party.”
State Court judge
Among those who will qualify with Jones at the Board of Elections office are candidates for the Bulloch County State Court judge’s office, held currently by Judge Joseph Cushner. He has held the judgeship since being appointed to complete an unexpired term in 2020 and was elected in 2022.
The incumbent or any challenger for the judgeship would each pay this year’s highest Bulloch County local candidate qualifying fee, $5,081.38. Being a Georgia lawyer and a Bulloch County resident are among the requirements for this full-time position.
The county Board of Commissioners officially set the fees for all of the county offices in December, but this was a required formality, since the fees are prescribed by state law and generally based on 3% of the salary for each office.
Board of Education
Candidates for Bulloch County Board of Education seats also qualify with Jones in the Elections Board office. In contrast to the judgeship, the school board seats – for which candidates need to be residents of a specific BOE district – have the county’s lowest candidate qualifying fee, $72. This is the same for any of the four BOE seats up for election this year, which are half of the seats on the eight-member board.
The Board of Education seats up for election this year are the District 2 post currently held by Elizabeth Williams, the District 4 seat held by Donna Clifton, the District 5 seat held by Glennera Martin and the District 6 seat held by Jimmy “Jay” Cook Jr.
First elected in 2022 and having begun her term Jan. 1, 2023, Williams recently began her third year as chairman of the board. But the board members select one of their own each year for the chair, so this does not go with the District 2 seat up for election.
Clifton, who like Williams is a retired school administrator, was also first elected in 2022 and joined the board in January 2023.
Martin, also a retired educator, and Cook, a bank executive, were both first elected in 2014 and are in their 12th year on the board.
County commissioners
Unlike the school board, the Board of Commissioners has members identified by political party, and the seats are also apportioned very differently. For the purpose of electing regular voting commissioners, the county is divided into just two districts.
Majority-white District 2 encompasses roughly two-thirds of the county population and elects a total of four commissioners, two in each cycle of even-numbered election years. Majority-minority District 1, with about one-third the total population, elects a total of two members, one in each cycle. There is also a countywide elected chairman, but the chair is now in the second year of a four-year term.
In Commission District 1, Seat B, also called “1-B,” is up for election this year. This seat is currently held by Commissioner Anthony Simmons, a Democrat and the longest-serving, in office since Jan. 1, 1992.
In Commission District 2, Seats B and D are up for election. Seat 2-B is held by Toby Conner, a Republican, first elected in 2022. Seat 2-D is held by Timmy Rushing, also a Republican, first elected in 2018.
The candidate qualifying fee for each of these three seats is $225.
Again, candidates for partisan offices do not qualify directly with Jones at the Board of Elections office. Instead, they qualify with county-level party officials. Jones offers both the Bulloch County Democratic Committee and the Bulloch County Republican Party space across the lobby from her office in the County Annex to conduct qualifying, but for the past many years only the Democrats have used the county-offered space.
She said she had preliminary word that the Democratic Committee will probably base its qualifying there again.
New GOP location
However, potential candidates should know that the Bulloch County Republican Party has relocated its candidate qualifying operation. For the past couple of election cycles, the county GOP had done qualifying from space near Lewis Color Inc. off Joe Kennedy Boulevard, behind Ogeechee Technical College.
But for the March 2-6, 2026 qualifying, the Bulloch County Republican Party will instead receive candidates in state Rep. Lehman Franklin’s legislative office at the Franklin Court building, 127 North Main St., Statesboro. The office will be open for this purpose the full available hours, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. that Monday through Thursday and 9 a.m.-noon that Friday, county Republican Party Chair Shannon K. Middleton stated in a Jan. 12 letter to the Elections Board. The letter also stated that Lawton Sack will be the party’s local official for qualifying, and Sack forwarded it to the Herald’s reporter Thursday.
One potential newcomer candidate, Frank Bedell III, has announced his intention to run for a county commission seat in District 2 as a Republican. Jones confirmed that Bedell filed a Declaration of Intention to Accept Campaign Contributions for this purpose on Oct. 14, 2025, and Bedell told the Statesboro Herald he intends to run for seat 2-B, which will make him a challenger to Conner if Conner also runs.
But no candidates are officially qualified at this point or can be until March 2-6.
Jones notes that she has all the forms available and can answer questions. The Bulloch County Elections office phone number is (912) 764-6502. The Georgia Secretary of State’s Office has online information for candidates and potential candidates at https://sos.ga.gov/candidate-qualifying-elected-office, including a more than 200-page handbook on candidate qualifications for various offices.
To carry out a new Georgia law passed as Senate Bill 199, the State Ethics Commission has a new website, https://ethics.ga.gov/, where candidates can file their campaign finance contribution reports and personal financial disclosures directly and where they will be required to do so as of 2027. But Jones remains the Bulloch County local filing officer for these forms in 2026.
Voter deadlines
Meanwhile, potential voters should be aware that April 20 is the deadline to register to vote or update their name and address information for the May 19 party primary and nonpartisan general election. March 2-May 8 is the time window to apply for an absentee ballot.