Preliminary results which came through late on Sunday night put him just 29 votes ahead of former Central Otago mayor Tony Lepper.
Incumbent councillor Alexa Forbes was battling for her seat in the earlier progress results, where it was a close call with her ahead of Mr Lepper by a single vote, at 8553 to 8552.
When preliminary results were received, Ms Forbes solidified her position on the council by moving ahead of Mr Laws to 9470 votes.
She trailed incumbent Gary Kelliher, who sat at a comfortable 9640 votes before final results are confirmed.
Mr Laws moved down, narrowly holding on to the third seat ahead of Mr Lepper at 9275.
Mr Lepper said it appeared he was too far behind the incumbents to gain a seat on the council.
"I’m a wee bit disappointed that the three incumbents have got back in, because I thought the council needed a change."
He had no plans to attempt getting a seat at the next election, but was pleased for Ms Forbes to have "had a bit of a kick along", having gained more support.
"I’ve been around long enough, and you never go back, but I’m confident they’ll fix up the problems they’ve had."
Ms Forbes said the jump in votes for her was nice to see.
"I’m obviously relieved about that, but I wouldn’t say [I’m in] until those special votes are counted."
She believed there were around 500 special votes left to be counted.
Ms Forbes said the best thing for any potential councillor was to "not get too attached".
Mr Laws declined a request for comment from the Otago Daily Times.
Official results are set to be released before Thursday, when all ordinary and special votes have been counted.
