POCATELLO — The Gate City has spoken.

In decisive fashion, voters in Pocatello have selected Mark Dahlquist as their next mayor.

A total of 7,238 people, or 62.06 percent, voted for Dahlquist in Tuesday's special runoff election compared to 4,424 people, or 37.94 percent, who cast ballots for challenger Greg Cates.

"It just feels phenomenal," Dahlquist said from his watch party at Portneuf Valley Brewing when final results came in Tuesday night. "It's just surreal. I'm just waiting for it all to sink in. I had such a great team of folks helping me out."

Much like the returns during the general election last month, Dahlquist jumped to an early lead with early and absentee votes and never looked back. He received 2,618 votes, or 68.8 percent of the 3,806 ballots that were cast early.

A significant 13.2 percent of Pocatello's 28,839 registered voters cast their ballot at the Bannock County Elections Office or via mail.

Dahlquist, a former longtime management executive at Farmers Insurance before serving as the CEO for NeighborWorks Pocatello for the past 19 years, will succeed Mayor Brian Blad, whose 16-year run comes to an end in January.

"We've got a lot of work to do," Dahlquist said. "The people out there, the voters of Pocatello, made it really clear that they wanted change. I'm going to be a mayor for all residents, regardless of who they are, regardless of who they voted for. I think the voters spoke loud and clear that they wanted change and I think they appreciated my platform, my leadership skills and my vision for the city. It just feels phenomenal."

A total of 11,665 Pocatello residents participated in Tuesday's runoff election — a turnout of 40.45 percent that included 159 same-day registrations.

The runoff became necessary after Dahlquist and Cates, the highest vote-getters in the eight-candidate field during last month's general election, failed to secure the required 50 percent of votes.

Elections officials said turnout Tuesday in Pocatello was down from 45 percent last month, though both Dahlquist and Cates picked up more voters. Dahlquist gained 2,103 voters and Cates gained 486 votes compared to their returns on Nov. 4.

Cates said he thought the runoff election was going to be much closer.

"The people of Pocatello chose who they wanted to run the city and it wasn't me," Cates said late Tuesday night. "But I have no regrets. I ran a good campaign, worked really hard and came up with some good plans."

Cates said he's disappointed voter turnout wasn't higher in the Nov. 4 election as well as in Tuesday's mayoral runoff.

"The toughest thing is to know that nearly two out of three people didn't vote," Cates said about Tuesday's turnout in Pocatello. "That's the hardest thing to deal with and I don't know how to fix it. Year after year there's the same low turnout. I don't know why people don't want to get more engaged in their city elections. I can't figure out why we can't get more people to vote."

Dahlquist ran on a platform centered on rebuilding community trust, transparent government and strategic economic development, according to his responses to questions during an Idaho State Journal forum last month.

Following the fatal shooting of Victor Perez, Dahlquist advocated for community policing initiatives, including restoring geographic sergeant assignments to strengthen neighborhood relationships and creating a registry for households with special situations to better inform responding officers.

He plans to conduct employee satisfaction surveys and establish a public task force to rebuild the community's trust in the police department. Drawing on his four decades of management experience, including turning around NeighborWorks from "financial disarray" to "exemplary status," Dahlquist supports restoring performance reviews citywide and bringing back detailed budget presentations through dashboards and summaries.

When it comes to economic development and city operations, Dahlquist proposed bringing the LA Semiconductor plant to full capacity, involving more private sector leaders in recruitment efforts and creating an "all hands on deck" approach to attracting new businesses.

He advocated for making government more accessible by restoring public comment periods to the beginning of City Council meetings and allowing dialogue between council members and residents.

He supports continued Historic Downtown Pocatello development through public-private partnerships but says relocating City Hall downtown isn't currently affordable given budget deficits. Dahlquist identifies Pocatello's challenges as "a revenue problem" that requires bringing in new businesses rather than raising taxes.

Dahlquist thanked Cates for the respectful campaign he ran.

"Greg ran a long hard campaign. Kudos to him," Dahlquist said. "He had a lot of great followers and put a lot of hard work and sacrifice into the campaign. We had a different roadmap of how we envisioned change for the city, but I just want to acknowledge him and tell the voters I'm ready to go to work in January."

Cates said he has a lot of respect for Dahlquist and hopes he does a good job as mayor.

"I hope he does well for the city and I wish him the best of luck," Cates said. "He ran a good campaign and is a nice guy. I hope he follows through with the promises he made."

Tuesday's runoff election marked the official end to the 2025 political season in the Gate City area, which also brought new leadership in Chubbuck with Rodney Burch unseating Mayor Kevin England, whose 12-year tenure running Pocatello's smaller northern neighbor will also come to an end in January.

Rounding out the change in area leadership are Stacy Satterfield and Ann Swanson, who secured their seats on the Pocatello City Council during last month's general election.

Cates said he's not sure what the future holds for him, especially in terms of future runs for political office.

"I'll have to think about it," Cates said about running for office again. "I'm going to take some time to rest and recoup. Never say never but at this point it's something I'm not entertaining at this moment."

Cates said he has "zero regrets" about how he ran his mayoral campaign.

"There's nothing I can look back on and say I should have done this or that," he said.