Openly gay City Commissioner Craig Lowe was declared mayor-elect of Gainesville, Florida on Friday, the Gainesville Sun reported.

A narrow April 13 victory for Lowe, 52, triggered a recount before officials would sign off on a winner. The new count, however, turned in similar results: 6,110 votes for Lowe, 6,068 votes for his opponent, Don Marsh.

Lowe captured just over 40% of the vote in a field of 5 candidates in the city's mayoral election last month, while Marsh trailed with 29%. As the two highest vote-getters without a majority vote, the two men faced off in last Tuesday's runoff election.

The campaign was long and turned ugly when Lowe opponents attacked his sexual orientation.

A sign that said “No Homo Mayor” was posted on the property of the Dove World Outreach Center and attracted national attention. One of its pastors, Wayne Sapp, went further, uploading several videos online in which he attacked Lowe.

“Here is Gainesville, they're getting ready to have a runoff election between two candidates and one of them is openly a homo, gay, fag – whatever you want to call him, I don't care,” Sapp says in one of the videos. “Bottom line is we cannot afford a homo mayor.”

“We got one running for mayor of Gainesville, trying to convert Gainesville into Homoville,” Sapp adds. “We can't have it.”

Lowe was also attacked for supporting a city ordinance that bans discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity (transgender protections) in the areas of employment, housing and public accommodations.

After city leaders in 2008 approved adding gender identity to an anti-discrimination measure that already included sexual orientation, opponents campaigned to place an initiative to repeal the law on the ballot. Voters in the college town, however, disagreed and the law remained in place.

One flier alleged that Lowe is “'responsible' for legally allowing men into women's restrooms!”

For his part, Lowe pretty much ignored the controversy. Marsh, however, accused Lowe supporters of falsely labeling him anti-gay for not denouncing the attacks.

Lowe, a two-term city commissioner, begins work as mayor on Monday.