Candace Hunziker and Tiana Thurber earned election to the Pittsboro Board of Commissioners amid a crowded field during Tuesday night’s local races.
Hunziker, the manager of a Chatham County chiropractic practice, was the clear leader of the pack and received 684 votes (25.46% of the voter total). Previously, Hunziker told Chapelboro she was inspired to run for town office because of her time as president of her neighborhood homeowners’ association. She began attending Board of Commissioner and planning board meetings to better understand what was happening around town and how it affected her neighborhood — and she said learned so much about how Pittsboro is laying the groundwork for significant population additions thanks to Chatham Park and other nearby development.
Thurber, owner of the Pittsboro business Reclamation, earned 518 votes (19.28%) to win the second commissioner seat. She and Hunziker ultimately coalesced into a tandem during the campaign season after the women began attending town meetings during the year and “naturally” connected over wanting to preserve downtown Pittsboro’s character.
“We realized that we cared about the same things, we realized we were on the same wave-length, and a lot our supporters were the same,” Hunziker said in an interview on Wednesday. “We care about protecting Pittsboro — especially historic downtown Pittsboro — and downtown businesses. We both really set out to listen to people. It was a natural alignment that created the same sense of shared purpose and I think that messages reached a lot of [like-minded] voters.”
When she filed during the summer, Thurber told Chapelboro the damage from Tropical Depression Chantal and the long recovery ahead for her store pushed her to declare her candidacy. The longtime Pittsboro resident said it remained a motivation through the campaign season as well — but so did her future constituents and Hunziker, who Thurber called “a great asset to our town.”
“I want to thank my community for believing in me and showing so much support over and over and over again…not just through the campaign, but also through my flooding experience,” Thurber said. “People have asked me to run for town commissioner for a long time and the [flood and community] really inspired me to be a better steward of my town.”
Alex Brinker received the most votes of any unelected candidate with 434 (16.15%). He was followed by Tobais Palmer (11.2%), Corey Forrest (10.53%), Nikkolas Shramek (9.97%), Freda Alston (4.5%) and Ashley Gross (2.61%).
The Board of Commissioners election was of the most intriguing races in the Chatham County community this fall, largely because of questions around which candidates would separate themselves in a crowded, inexperienced field. The eight residents who filed in July were all first-time candidates — and ran for two open seats left by Commissioner Pamela Baldwin ending her elected service after five terms and Commissioner James Vose stepping away from the board after one. The change in leadership comes as Pittsboro prepares for significant growth from the Chatham Park master-developed community, which is adding thousands of homes and square-footage of development across 7,000 acres near town limits.
Hunziker said she wants to ensure the town board works with developers to create consistency for the impending development and to either integrate with or have it compliment downtown Pittsboro, which she identified as a key part of the community’s charm. She said she is excited for the new town hall and development opportunities downtown from phasing out publicly-owned facilities, but added that she will aim to make sure it becomes “generic” or “Cary West.”
“I think people want to make sure we keep our unique generational businesses, our unique entrepreneurial businesses and don’t become a cookie-cutter, chain [business] type of downtown,” Hunziker said. “Right now, it is our draw. [When I talk with visitors at public events], every time I’d talk with people it seemed like they were from Siler City, they were from Sanford, they were from Carrboro or Chapel Hill. They’re coming because we have a unique downtown businesses area, and I think it’s very important we make sure to keep that — and I think it’s possible to do that. We need more commercial in Pittsboro, but we need to make sure the downtown is still unique.”
While there is apprehension among some residents about how the newer, outer-lying neighborhoods of town will interact with downtown, Thurber stressed the importance of making sure all Pittsboro residents feel represented and included. She said she believes some of her support came from being a local, but she wants to ensure Chatham Park residents are properly welcomed and brought up to speed on what makes the community special.
“To keep introducing this cool area that they’ve moved to, to keep including them and making them part of the process I think is really how we’re going to do that best,” Thurber said. “I’ve talked to a lot of Chatham Park people who are apologetic and didn’t know about the locals feeling so strongly [about the town’s growth], and I don’t want them to feel that way. I want them to feel included — and so do the people who are here.”
Hunziker said she wants to try and “shorten the learning curve” necessary when joining elected office, pointing to already building relationships with town staff and taking the local citizen academy “Pittsboro 101” to get up to speed. But she said much of that hope and confidence came from being very engaged with the local government, and she encouraged other Pittsboro residents to do the same.
“I learned more from knocking on doors, talking with people and asking simple questions, because I heard not only concerns, but I heard great ideas, and they need to keep that coming,” Hunziker said. “I’d encourage everyone who came out to vote — and especially people who didn’t — to tune into board meetings, sign up on the town [website for] alerts to tell you what’s going on. Come to the board meetings, get involved, join the boards…because it takes more than just the people on the boards to shape Pittsboro’s future. It takes consistent engagement, and not just on Election Day, if we’re going to build the town that everybody wants.”
The race for Pittsboro Mayor, meanwhile, was unopposed once again in 2025. Kyle Shipp earned election to a second term — and his first four-year term in the office, after the town changed its rules in 2023 to align the mayor election with Board of Commissioners two-seat cycles. Shipp, Hunziker and Thurber will be sworn into their terms during the board’s December meeting, as they join sitting commissioners John Bonitz, J.A. Farrell and John Foley.
For results from all local elections in Orange County, click here. Additional Chatham County results can be found on the North Carolina Board of Elections website.
Editor’s Note: This story was initially published on Tuesday, Nov. 4. It has since been updated to include interviews with Candace Hunziker and Tiana Thurber.
Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our newsletter.
