Warren Aubin, Bobby Bourke expect to lose spots on Bathurst council

The pair, who have three and four terms to their names respectively, are among four incumbents unlikely to remain on council once the voting is finalised.

Candidates need to have one quota, which is a percentage of the overall formal votes, to be elected.

As of Sunday, Mr Aubin's team had just 0.46 quotas, while Mr Bourke had 0.19.

At this stage, even with some mail in votes and preferences to be counted, they have accepted that their time as councillors has more than likely come to an end.

"I think I'm done. I don't see too much positives coming, but that's fine, I've been up there 13 years and it was going to be my last term if I was re-elected anyway," Mr Aubin said.

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He has no regrets about the way he ran his campaign.

"I sent out 16,000 fliers, I had 40 corflutes all over the place. I did what I always do," he said.

"I just feel there was a different flavour about the whole election this year and it was just filthy, but it is what it is. I've accepted that.

"A lot of these candidates were putting out the slogan 'Vote for a change', so they've now got the change. Let's see what they do with it."

Both he and Mr Bourke believe a negative campaign by Future Bathurst, which targeted themselves and incumbents Alex Christian, Graeme Hanger and Ian North, had hurt them at the polls.

"We had those third party candidates out there spending thousands of dollars to not get that five back on council and they probably achieved that," Mr Bourke said.

But that was not the only challenge.

After a mix-up with the ticket he was set to appear on, Mr Bourke found himself as a solo candidate below the line.

With 12 tickets above the line and his name buried in amongst 67 others below the line, it was difficult for people to find him on the ballot paper.

Mr Bourke also suspects that some of the more than 2400 informal votes received could have been votes for him, had they been filled out correctly.

"The people that follow me think that 'Oh, if I just give Bobby Bourke one like the others, that's it', so I missed out on that," he said.

"If I was on the other side [of the line], they could have just put one and walked away."

Despite the way the election has gone, Mr Bourke still wishes the new council well.

Neither he or Mr Aubin intend to run for council again, but Mr Bourke said he is open to supporting other tickets in future.

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