Wicomico County Council, District 4
Wicomico County · 2026-11-03
District 4 produced the closest result of any race decided by Wicomico voters alone: Erin Patterson took the Democratic nomination by eleven votes, 391 to Aaron Guy's 380. Bobby Lee Leath, Jr. was unopposed for the Republican nomination.
This is an open seat. Josh Hastings, who currently represents District 4, is running for the House of Delegates instead.
What this office does
The County Council is Wicomico County's legislative body. It passes local bills and resolutions, approves the county budget submitted by the County Executive, confirms appointments, and provides oversight of county departments. Members serve four-year terms.
Recent council business gives a sense of the work: emergency legislation creating oversight of the county nursing home, the annual budget and its tax rate, land-use and annexation questions, and the county's mobile home park tax.
Candidates
Listed alphabetically by surname. Each summary is written only from the official record and the candidate's own campaign material — never from what anyone else says about them. Other coverage is listed under each candidate and labelled by what kind of source it is.
Bobby Lee Leath, Jr.
Republican
Leath won the Republican nomination unopposed with 695 votes.
He did not complete either questionnaire put to candidates this cycle — the Baltimore Sun and Capital Gazette's before the primary, and the Salisbury Daily Times' in September, which named him among those who did not take part. No statement of his priorities in his own words has been published this cycle.
Erin Patterson
Democratic
Patterson won the Democratic primary with 391 votes to Aaron Guy's 380 — a margin of eleven votes, the closest county result of the night.
She is 37, lives in District 4, and works for Wicomico County Public Schools. She holds a political science degree from Salisbury University, interned in a congressional office, has advocated with the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, and serves on the school system's Special Education Citizens Advisory Committee.
Answering the Salisbury Daily Times in September, she called on energy for more competition and more choice for consumers, raised community-choice aggregation, and backed investment in grid reliability and generation.
She opposes data centres, citing their demands on electricity, water and rural land. On the county's greatest need she described a broad affordability problem — housing, transport, jobs, food and schools — alongside infrastructure, landfill capacity and water quality.
She did not complete the Baltimore Sun and Capital Gazette's pre-primary questionnaire.
Sources for this race
Official record
Official 2026 Gubernatorial Primary Election Results — Wicomico County
Wicomico County Board of Elections
News reporting
Wicomico County to drop at-large elections after ACLU lawsuit
Wicomico County Council candidates in their own words (Delmarva Now — subscription required)