DECATUR - For nine candidates in the 2009 race, the top spot on the ballot came down to a cookie tin.

City Clerk Celeste Harris held a lottery Thursday morning for the top spots for mayor, the two-year city council seat, and the three council seats with four-year terms.

The candidates wrote their names on slips of paper and deposited them in Harris' cookie tin, where they were drawn and the order recorded.

Ballot order is determined by the order in which candidates file their petitions with the city clerk. Those candidates who showed up first thing in the morning on the first day of filing enter a lottery to determine the order that the early birds are listed.

Businessman Stephen Daniels took the top of the ballot for the mayoral race, followed by city councilman Mike McElroy and Martha Montgomery-Lattimore.

The Rev. Carey A. Grady will be at the top of the ballot for the four-year council seats, followed by councilwoman Betsy Stockard, firefighter and union leader Adam Ruderman, and councilman Dan Caulkins.

City councilman Larry Foster will sit atop the ballot for the two-year seat the council appointed him to earlier this year. Following his name will be Decatur Tribune reporter Patrick McDaniel and businesswoman Marcia Phillips.

Harris said that as of Thursday morning, farmer Adam Brown, who filed for both the two-year and four-year seats, had not yet declared he would remove his name from either list. Should he choose to pursue the two-year seat, a primary election would be necessary.

Brown has until 5 p.m. Monday to withdraw from one race or else be removed from them both.

Harris said the volume of early filers is not irregular, though the race is certainly shaping up to be.

"It's a bit of an unusual year," Harris said. "We have five (open positions on the council), so I really have nothing to compare it to."

THEORDER

The ballot order for the 2009 consolidated election will be:

MAYOR

1) Stephen Daniels

2) Mike McElroy

3) Martha Montgomery-Lattimore

FOUR-YEAR COUNCIL TERM

1) The Rev. Carey A. Grady

2) Betsy Stockard (Incumbent)

3) Adam Ruderman

4) Dan Caulkins (Incumbent)

5) Matthew Jackson

6) Gloria Bates-Cole

7) Jerry Dawson

8) Julie Moore

9) Yvonne Shaw

TWO-YEAR COUNCIL TERM

1) Larry Foster (Incumbent)

2) Patrick McDaniel

3) Marcia Phillips

4) Derek Wheeler

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