Early Voting Opens Saturday: Three Wesley Chapel Sites, 11 Candidates, Three School Board Seats

Early voting in Pasco County's Aug. 18 primary opens Saturday, Aug. 8, and three of the county's 12 sites sit inside Wesley Chapel: New River Library, Wesley Chapel District Park and the Wiregrass Ranch Sports Campus. On the ballot are 11 candidates for three School Board seats, the board that decides how fast this end of the county gets new classrooms, what the phone rules look like and what teachers get paid. School Board races in Florida are nonpartisan and countywide, so every registered Pasco voter, Republican, Democrat or no party, votes in all three.

Early voting runs through Saturday, Aug. 15. The elections office lists hours of 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Bring both photo and signature identification. A Florida driver license covers both; a student ID with no signature does not, so you would need a second form.

Where to vote early in Wesley Chapel

Site	Address
New River Library	34043 State Road 54
Wesley Chapel District Park	7727 Boyette Road
Wiregrass Ranch Sports Campus	3021 Sports Coast Way

You can use any of the 12 countywide sites, not just the one nearest your house. Two locations from past cycles, the Hudson Library and the Regency Park Library, are not being used in 2026.

The District 1 race is the one with Wesley Chapel in it

District 1 covers parts of Wesley Chapel and Land O'Lakes, and it is open. Incumbent Al Hernandez is not seeking reelection after four years, and none of the four candidates has served on the board before. Wesley Chapel's other seat is District 2, which is not on the ballot this year.

Gino Collura, 40, of San Antonio leads the money race at $20,750 raised. He is a business consultant with a USF doctorate, a former Pasco Middle School and Sunlake High teacher, and one of Gov. Ron DeSantis' appointees to the Pasco-Hernando State College Board of Trustees. Superintendent John Legg has endorsed him, as have outgoing Sheriff Chris Nocco and Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson. Collura told local media outlets that the county's growth is what pushed him to run, and that he wants competitive teacher pay, tighter limits on personal devices in class and behavioral threat assessment work on the safety side.

Kimberly Coward, 47, of Dade City has raised $16,510, second in the field. She grew up in Dade City, graduated from Pasco High and spent more than a decade in the Air Force, including nine and a half years as a JAG officer at MacDill Air Force Base.

Christopher King of Zephyrhills is a Marine veteran with four combat tours who later managed tours for his grandfather, blues musician B.B. King. He founded an anti-trafficking nonprofit that runs etiquette and reintegration programs for young people. King has said cell phones have hollowed out school culture, and that board members are not visible enough in the communities they represent.

Brian Perras is a Pasco substitute teacher, Navy veteran and podcaster who describes himself as a constitutional conservative. His largely self-funded campaign centers on civics, career and technical education, school food and a four-day school week. He has also said he was held back a grade as a Pasco student and wants smaller classes and more aides for kids with learning disabilities.

Of the 11 candidates across all three races, two are registered Democrats: King and Coward.

The other two seats on your ballot

District 3 drew the biggest field, with five candidates: Matt Geiger, Sean O'Flannery, Kirk Phillips, Erin Stroupe and Mollyana Ward. District 5 is the only race with an incumbent defending a seat, where Megan Harding faces Michelle Mandarin.

Mail ballots do not carry over

Every vote-by-mail request in Pasco expired after the 2024 general election. If you have not submitted a new request for 2026, no ballot is coming. Requests go through the Supervisor of Elections office or by phone at 800-851-8754. The office had mailed more than 37,000 mail ballots as of mid-July. Voter registration books closed July 20, so anyone who missed that date is out for this primary.

A candidate who clears 50 percent on Aug. 18 wins the seat outright. If nobody does, the top two advance to the Nov. 3 general election, which means at least one of these races is likely to still be live in the fall. Polls close at 7 p.m. on primary night, and the elections office posts turnout updates every ten minutes until 6 p.m., with results going up after the polls close.

For more on how county and school decisions land in our neighborhoods, visit Wesley Chapel Community Website and read more government and politics stories or catch up on local education coverage. Follow along on Facebook, Instagram and X, and if you have been to one of the local early voting sites this week, tell us how it went and join the conversation in our Community Forum.