How many times does this stupid f’ing experiment have to fail before the city and the school district wakeup and go, “Guess it doesn’t work.”
Only one of every 42 registered voters cast a ballot for the incumbent in Tuesday’s Sioux Falls School Board election, but he cruised to a second term.
Â
Darin Daby will be joined on the board by newcomer Kate Parker, who earned votes from every 43rd registered voter. The ratio for the losing candidate, Mike Deitschman, was one in 63.
I will admit, I did not vote. Which is rare for me. But like I have said before, my property taxes are low and I don’t have any kids. I also believe public education is one of the wisest uses of tax money. I didn’t really like any of the candidates either. One was a rubberstamper, one co-owns a family business that is anti-union and anti-worker rights and one is a teabagger defender. So no votes from me. I also don’t know where my super precint is, I usually just absentee vote at the courthouse.
The school district used 23 super precincts, so most voters had a different voting place compared to the 2008 general election. Deitschman said he had supporters calling him to say they couldn’t find their polling place.
Surprise! Surprise!
Daby called the turnout “disappointing” and said he’s willing to listen to ideas on how to raise public interest.
Well Daby, you are the president of the school board, why not suggest getting rid of super precints? That would be a start.
We have super precints to aproximately save $16,000 per election, but the city has no problem with paying a consultant $50,000 to tell us what a historical window looks like. Go figure.* There should never be a pricetag on one of greatest rights in a democracy. It’s foolish, petty and UnAmerican to limit voters. But of course we live in a city that violates many constitutional rights, so it shouldn’t surprise anyone.
*(BTW- I know that the city didn’t pay for this election, but have used super precints in the past with similiar results).
This was an email I got from the city clerk’s office. Good News!
“On a related note, Monday I addressed the Council’s budget for 2010. Council has budgeted for the full amount of polling places for 2010 and will not be using super precincts.”
Not sure if this has to do with the super precints not working or because of the importance of the elections in 2010.
The city election will have up to 4 new councilors running (depending who runs for mayor) and a mayor.
And the Fall election is a national mid-term election.
Pretty important elections.
l3wis says:
May 13th, 2009 at 8:10 am
This was an email I got from the city clerk’s office. Good News!
“On a related note, Monday I addressed the Council’s budget for 2010. Council has budgeted for the full amount of polling places for 2010 and will not be using super precincts.â€
You read my mind. I was just going to ask about that. My theory on that issue is this. The harder the city can make it for Joe SixPack to get out and vote, the more likely they’ll succeed at shoveling garbage down our throats…Like an “Events” center.
Funny. I told the city clerk that in conservative states there are fewer voter rights.
I agree Warren. People become very apathetic when 1) they are not really required to vote 2) only have three choices for two seats 3) don’t even know where they are supposed to go.
I knew the voter turnout was going to be low, but that is almost embarrassing. But like I said, would you want to take 10-20 minutes out of your day to first try to find your polling site then pick the two best turds out of a three turd pile?
The harder the city can make it for Joe SixPack to get out and vote, the more likely they’ll succeed at shoveling garbage down our throats…Like an “Events†center.
On the contrary. The super precincts make it harder for the demographic likely to support a new EC to get to the polls. Retirees with time on their hands can take the time to find the location. Everyone else just forgets about them.
Those retirees are not exactly the most likely people to vote for a new EC.
You can look at it both ways. I don’t care what your political beliefs are, it should be easy for anyone to vote, anywhere.
I see Joel Rosenthal is OUTRAGED!
http://sdstraighttalk.squarespace.com/straight-talk/2009/5/13/355-turnout-disgusting.html
You can look at it both ways. I don’t care what your political beliefs are, it should be easy for anyone to vote, anywhere.
No question there. If someone is going to take office or an issue be resolved, it should be the result of what voters decide, not the result of some shyster manipulating the polls or polling places to reduce turnout.
This comment in today’s Argus article about the voter turnout basically says the attitude;
“We want to spend money on the children in the classrooms. … If we had 57 (precints instead of 23), we’d have just had 100 more bored people” working at the polling places, Chase said.
Gawd forbid we have ‘bored people’ helping us practice our greatest democratic right! Yeah, because democracy is great, accept for it being so boring. Maybe we should have military escorts to the polls like they do when they vote in Iraq, to make it more exciting.
As for speding money ‘in the classroom’ – I’m wondering how many ‘classrooms’ would be affected by dropping $6.8 million on a football stadium? Just wondering?