Mr Curran won 3128 first preference votes, followed by Anne Napoli on 1196 and Dino Zappcosta on 1081. Rina Mercuri earned 950 votes and Carmel La Rocca has 472.

It's estimated around half of Griffith's voters cast their votes at pre-poll and those votes will only be counted this week.

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Mr Curran emerged with a handy lead from each of the city's Saturday polling places and described the result as "surprising".

"I couldn't be happier, I know there would be a shake up with John (Dal Broi) leaving," he said.

"I feel our positive campaign has paid off. The people of Griffith want some positivity."

Mr Curran acknowledged the result could still swing either way once the pre-poll votes were tallied, but both Mrs Napoli or Mr Zappacosta would have to bridge 2000 vote deficit

Mr Curran spent Saturday outside the Griffith East Public School polling booth and said the voters he spoke to on the day seemed already to have made their decision.

He said there was a different feel to the election on the weekend and not just because different rules in play because of COVID-19.

"There seemed to be a lot of certainty. People seemed to know what they were going to do."

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Based on the results so far, Mr Curran's fellow members of Group D - Laurie Testoni and Shari Blumer, could also find a place around the council table.

He said there was determination to follow through on their campaign.

"As a possible mayor, I'm very determined to follow through on what we've bee talking about for the last month," he said.

"Previous councillors and mayors have done great things, let's build on that, let's a build a better path rather than fixing one single issue.

"The issue is important but let's improve how things are done overall."

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