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In case you missed it, here are the Monona results (winners in bold):
Wood 1313
Busse 1306
Veserat 1256
Speight 1255
Miller 592
There will be a recount, so the results are not final. State law provides for a free recount when the margin "is less than 10 if 1,000 or less votes are cast or not more than 0.5% of the total votes cast for the office or on the question if more than 1,000 votes" (see sec. 9.01 Stats.).
The MG School Board race was pretty clear cut.
Norton 2677
Ace 2671
McCutchin 2281
Duplayee 2139
One person, one vote, one election.
Tuesday, April 07, 2009
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Why is that Monona voters keep electing unqualified candidates to the school board. That's three in a row now?
ReplyDeleteYou have to wonder where Chad would stand if Bob's name wasn't on the ballot, what a HUGE shame!
ReplyDeleteChad has very progressive views that would be a benifit to all Monona residents short term and down the road. I think representatives like Chad would create a community that many people would desire to live in, and that would greatly increase our property values. If Chad is still on the outside looking in after a recount, I hope he'll run again next time and perhaps unseat someone who'll be running then. I'd also support Chad if he chose to run for Dane Co. board! Thanks for your service Chad.
Jessica Ace won, so the voters judged her to be qualified and that's the only evaluation of her qualification that matters.
ReplyDeleteWhoa! We already have a great county board supervisor in Robin Schmidt.
ReplyDeleteThe question I ask is where are all those Obama voters who did not turn out yesterday?
"Why is that Monona voters keep electing unqualified candidates to the school board. That's three in a row now?"
ReplyDeleteGood Lord. Why DID people keep electing people who were jerks, know it alls and horse's arse to the general public.
"Why is that Monona voters keep electing unqualified candidates to the school board. That's three in a row now?"
ReplyDeleteknow what u mean scientist, meatcutter, but who else?
great civics lesson for our kids. every vote counts.
ReplyDeleteWe have a few more details on the possible recount process, which will be open to the public, in our story on the Herald-Independent website - http://herald-independent.com/main.asp?SectionID=2&SubSectionID=2&ArticleID=783
ReplyDeleteAlso, someone wrote-in 'Larry the Cable Guy'. Hilarious.
-Adam
Maybe they are looking at the state of the economy and wondering why they voted for Obama.
ReplyDeleteNot sure why anonymous says three unqualified in a row? Is he/she saying that we feel Jessica, Lionel and Jason are unqualified?
ReplyDeleteAnonymous said...
ReplyDeleteComments on tonight's elections, and your new colleagues?
Many important things to come in the city.........your thoughts at this pivotal time are extremely important to 49.9% of eligible, active voters.
Tuesday, April 07, 2009
Doug Wood said...
Comments on election, etc. is off topic for this post. Please re-post under the election story. Thanks.
Reposted, as you requested.
Comments on election? Again, we don't know for sure who won, but let's assume for the moment that Mike Veserat won. I think he and Jim Busse will be busy getting up to speed; not being snide at all. There is a ton of stuff that goes into running a small city and it takes time and effort to learn.
ReplyDeleteAt the same time they will bring new perspectives and that's a plus.
Nonetheless, one concern is that it will be more difficult for new ideas to get a full public airing. It takes two council members it get items on our agenda.
Most of the specific issues were discussed to some extent in the campaign; probably we did not discuss flooding, lake levels, and lake water quality enough.
There will most likely be things that arise that none of us have thought about yet.
I certainly do not read the election results as a mandate one way or the other - given just a 57 vote margin from first to fourth.
My point re: Obama voters was two-fold. First, many of them simply did not vote. Where were they?
ReplyDeleteSecond, while individual choices will vary, on the whole I would expect Obama voters to be more likely to vote for Chad and myself than not.
By the way, to the other poster who blasted Chad, if you send me the comments with your name attached I will consider posting them, otherwise not.
What happened to the Obama voters?
ReplyDeleteOne (but not the only) factor is the old 'throw out the bums' argument.
I think you have an element in this city (any city for that matter) that is simply going to vote against the existing rule in tough economic/social times. The city has big debt. Taxes are going up. Some of this has NOTHING to do with the city - such as the tax increases from the school referendum - but many people simply don't see that. They see eroding services, big debt, rising taxes - and they walk into the booth and vote to try someone else. We saw it all over the country last year. People were tired of the same old thing - and whether the incumbent deserved it or not, they got the boot. And in Monona, that means less of the ruling body.
I think Mike Duplayee (forgive me if I spelled his name incorrectly) felt some of this wrath too. He represented the old guard on the school board, and I don't doubt that a lot of people simply voted against him. With all the issues that have arisen within the school district over the past few years (expensive and contentious referendum, school closing in Monona, the principal cut at Maywood, talk off closing Maywood, etc.), it's easy for people to just throw up their arms and pick someone new - and hope it's better.
Matt, those are some interesting thoughts, but I think the explanation is simpler. Democratic-leaning voters are simply much less likely to vote in spring/municipal elections than in the fall.
ReplyDeleteLast November there were about 5050voters in Monona. This spring there were about 2450 voters in Monona. I think it is self-apparent that if those other 2600 voters had voted this week we would have had a very different set of results.
This turnout differential is not new and certainly is not unique to Monona. Even in the spring 2006 school referendum election there were just 3329 Monona votes cast. That was a tidal wave of turnout for a spring election.
That same fall, there were about 4150 votes cast in Monona for the gubenatorial snoozefest (Doyle vs. Green).
Most years the spring/fall turnout difference is much, much larger than in 2006.
Spring voters universally are older and more conservative than fall voters. When those 2600 voters (the ones who voted last fall, but not this spring) stay home, they forfeit control of city government and let the other half of the eligible choose for them.
How do you get fall voters to give a rat's arse about local government? If you figure it out, let me know.
And we here in Dane County have high turnout than the rest of the state and the state has higher turnout than most parts of the country.
You get them to vote by having all elections in the fall? Lots of pros and cons there, I'm sure, but other folks who hve spent time in other states tell me they always voted for everything in the fall.
ReplyDeleteAlso, regarding the other strand on our at-large races, I googled and quickly found that courts have found this type of election to be unconstitutional in various places because it violates the voter rights act. The reason wouldn't really apply in our fair city, at least not yet, because the courts have held that it discriminates against minorities. Still it's kinda interesting.
"I think it is self-apparent that if those other 2600 voters had voted this week we would have had a very different set of results."
ReplyDeleteI strongly disaggre with your feelings. I voted for Obama and did not vote for Mr. Speight.
I think there are a fair amount of young voters int he spring who are concerned about the school district, it is NOT all old voters. Frankly, I always vote a little more conservative in local elections then in national.
I felt that Mr. Speight had lost his focus about our fine city and was on a personal mission.. Frankly, I think you loose
your way from time-to-time, just my opinion. Yet, I voted for you (that is another story.)
"Spring voters universally are older and more conservative than fall voters."
I know that is the trend, but I do not think that is fact when it comes to Monona.
One other thing, who says Mike is more "conservative" then Chad? What is conservative? I think he is different than Chad. My assumption about Mike is that he is fiscally conservative and focused((and I think cities need to be fiscally conservative), but pretty liberal socially.
Heck, he is probably more of a libertarian than Chad. Yes, yes Busse is more conservative and probably too conservative for me, but his election might have more to do with the amount of time he has lived in our town then his politics.
two cents,
I also think that there is an element of person that tends to be more liberal on social issues, but lean conservative on economic issues. This gets magnified at the local level, because now I'm not voting about getting out of Iraq or keeping abortion legal or whatever. Taxes, wise management of the city, crime, etc., become larger issues for (some) people. That's why you often see local elections (especially these April type elections) produce more 'conservative' candidates - I stress the conservative because their ideas are often regarding fiscal issues. As someone pointed out, in many ways, it's more of a libertarian point of view than conservative/liberal.
ReplyDelete"libertarian?" If our council tended that way, then the chicken thing would have sailed through without it turning into such a big deal. Afterall, that's about leaving people alone as long as they don't bother anyone else, right? And Veserat made a big deal in his smear letter about the composting toilet thing. Once That is something a libertarian would totally support. So I don't think I'm buying the libertarian thing at all. Besids, libertarians wouldn't support taxpayer funded public libraries, community rec programs, etc which I'm pretty sure all four candiates were in favor of. I don't think we've had anyone who comes close to be a libertarian since Tom Stolper.
ReplyDelete