Even though the turnout was low, Butler County voters on Tuesday picked a number of candidates for municipal seats in the fall general election.

Republicans nominated Butler Township police officer Mike Slupe for their sheriff candidate. He beat county detective Scott Roskovski by 778 votes.

Slupe received 7,027 votes with Roskovski got 6,249.

For the open district judge seat in Cranberry Township, township Police Sgt. Dave Kovach defeated four challengers to take both the Republican and Democratic nominations.

Kovach received 819 Republican and 376 Democratic votes.

In the GOP primary, attorney Juliet Abel received 614 votes, followed by attorney Kelley Morrone with 572 votes, Teri Lynn Michaels with 179 votes and attorney Tom Campbell with 92 votes.

In the Democratic primary, Abel received 309 votes, Morrone, 265 votes, Michaels, 78 votes and Campbell 27 votes.

In Slippery Rock Township, two measures to allow buying alcohol by the drink passed, apparently with the help of Slippery Rock University students.

Voters decided on two referendums to allow both malt brewed beverages and liquor licenses. The vote was close, but, according to Regis Young, director of the county Bureau of Elections, 50 absentee ballots passed the referendum.

In a total including the absentee ballots, the malt brewed license referendum got 239 yes votes and 225 no votes while the liquor license referendum came in with 237 votes yes and 231 votes against it.

Most of those absentee ballots were from SRU students.

Voter turnout was 17 percent countywide.