Kingfisher County is going to have four new faces filling prominent seats next year.

None of the incumbents threw their respective names in the hat last week during the filing period for the offices of county sheriff, clerk, court clerk or commissioner for District 2.

Sheriff Dennis Banther, Court Clerk Lisa Markus, County Clerk Jeannie Boevers and Commissioner Ray Shimanek have all announced they plan to retire at the end of their terms this year.

Once last Friday’s filing period ended, races had developed for all but one of the seats.

The exception was for county clerk as Emily Lee of Hennessey was the lone person to file.

Lee, currently the chief deputy clerk in that office, will be sworn in as the new county clerk Jan. 6, 2025.

The largest race will be for sheriff as five men filed to succeed Banther.

Two of them - Deputy Jonathan Riedlinger and Sgt. Michael Dean Shults - currently work for the department.

Also filing were two police chiefs from the county: Aaron Pitts of Hennessey and Forrest Smith of Okarche.

Also filing was Jeremiah Loper, formerly a member of the HPD staff.

All five filed as Republicans and will be on the primary election ballot June 18. (Ed. note: Candidates had until Tuesday after press time to withdraw their candidacy. Contests of candidacy were also due Tuesday after press time.)

If no candidate receives more than 50 percent of the votes cast, the top two vote getters will move on to the Aug. 27 runoff election.

Three Hennessey men have filed to fill Shimanek’s seat as District 2 commissioner.

Mike Sparks and Austin Whittenburg have filed as Republicans and will be on the June 18 primary ballot.

The winner will move on to the general election on Nov. 5 to face David Roller of Hennessey, a Democrat candidate.

The office of court clerk will be decided June 18.

Jessica Conner of Kingfi sher and Lauren Stroh of Okarche have both filed as Republicans.