Birmingham area voters will return to the polls again in October to decide who will represent them in the Alabama House of Representatives following Tuesday’s special election for the District 55 seat.

Travis Hendrix and Sylvia Swayne, both Democrats, will face off Oct. 24 in a runoff election. Hendrix and Swayne led the field in unofficial results Tuesday evening, though none of the seven candidates received a majority of the votes to win.

Hendrix, a Birmingham police sergeant, ended the evening with 670 votes or 27.91 percent. Swayne, a customer service manager and Alabama’s first transgender candidate, got 515 votes, or 21.45 percent.

The District 55 seat represents much of western Jefferson County and runs from Birmingham’s Southside into West End, Ensley and Fairfield.

The special election was held because former Rep. Fred Plump resigned in May after pleading guilty to charges in a federal corruption case.

Plump was a freshman representative who served less than a year before a kickback scandal ended his political career. He will be sentenced on Oct. 23 — just a day before his House replacement is selected.

The other primary candidates seeking to replace Plump were Kenneth Coachman, Phyllis E. Oden-Jones, Ves Marable, Cara McClure and Antwon Bernard Womack. Turnout was low Tuesday with just 3,140 of the 25,000 registered voters participating, according to unofficial results with 96.77 percent of the votes counted reporting.

This race is a second run for Hendrix. He placed third for the seat in 2022.

“I really do understand the needs of the people because I personally experienced them,” he told AL.com ahead of the election. “The resource that saved me was education, so I really want to advocate for education by making sure these students and the teacher have all the tools and the resources they need to continue to be successful. I want to bring some value and a better quality of life to my neighborhood, in particular Ensley and Fairfield because it has been suffering for so long.”

Hendrix spoke of the need to enhance public safety. After losing two brothers and an uncle to gun violence, Hendrix also knows the personal toll that violence has on families.

Hendrix said he understands the urgency of bipartisan cooperation to deliver on his platform, including expanding access to broadband and lowering grocery taxes in an overwhelmingly Republican legislature.

“You’ve got to develop a relationship. That’s part of the job,” he said. “In order for you to be effective or to pass any type of bill or law, you have to build relationships across the aisle and that’s something I have no problem with.”

Swayne has said she is running to be a voice for issues that are not being currently addressed.

“We’re not activating people in the community, or young people, to oppose or speak out about what’s going on at the Capitol,” Swayne said. “And for me, I realized that if that’s the environment that we’re tolerating, then somebody has to work with people to change. I think at the state level is where we see a lot of division.”

Additionally, Swayne listed state investment in mass transportation among her priorities.