Reed easily wins Sixth Ward primary

QUINCY — Quincy’s lone primary on Tuesday saw Jake Reed score a convincing win over Natalie Thompson in the city’s Sixth Ward.

Reed, who won the Republican primary with 68 percent of the vote, will face Democrat Patty Maples in the April 4 general election. Maples was appointed to fill the term when Katie Awerkamp resigned from the seat after she moved out of the ward.

More than 300 people voted on Tuesday, which was a decent turnout for a single race primary election.

“When I went out campaigning the past few months I knocked on over 600 doors,” he said. “I think that was effective.”

Reed said infrastructure and recycling were the two biggest issues he heard from the ward’s residence.

“The main concern was infrastructure…all the roads,” he said. “They would tell me which roads were bad, but they were also happy when the city was there fixing the curbs and gutters.”

Reed said he wanted to see how effective the city’s new drop-off recycling program will be as curbside pickup service goes away this week, but added that the cost of buying new recycling trucks probably makes the chances of the service every coming back pretty slim.

“Recycling is certainly an issue, but I still plan to offer recycling pickup for the elderly and disabled whether I win (the general election race) in April or not,” he said.