Thanks to early voting, 5% of the vote is already in

Through the first five days, early voting remains brisk

Yesterday, I had the time to cast my ballot at the Board of Elections office in the old Miami County Courthouse. While waiting in line, one of the biggest supporters of this publication was walking out and said, “We need more stats!”

Well, never let it be never said that this publication does not aim to please our readers!

As I said hello to the kind Board of Elections worker, I asked how turnout has been. She said turnout has been steady and brisk. The numbers bear that out.

Monday was the fifth day of early voting, and 4,066 ballots have already been cast in November’s election. This equates to roughly 5% of all voters in Miami County. When we dig into the numbers a little deeper, we see some interesting trends occur.

Early voting seems more popular with partisan voters, this is probably due to the fact that the minds of these voters have already been set and when early voting comes around, campaigns are less inclined to be in a mode to persuade voters and more in a mode to get out the vote and drive turnout.

And early voting is becoming a more pronounced strategy for these campaigns to drive turnout. As of yesterday, roughly 10% of the county’s registered republicans have cast a ballot and 15% of the county’s registered democrats have cast ballots. Only 2.5% of the county’s non-party voters have cast ballots.

There are also some interesting geographic trends that show up in early voting. Not only is Troy the county seat, but it’s also the largest city in the county. Roughly 1 in 4 registered voters live in Troy and as of this writing, 7% of all Trojans have already cast a ballot.

Tipp City is also strong in the early vote. The community, home to roughly 1 in 10 voters in the county (7,964 registered voters live in Tipp City), have seen 5% of their voters cast an early ballot.

But, the outlying communities are below the 5% trend line. Only 4% of registered voters in West Milton and Huber Heights have already cast ballots, and only 3% of registered voters in Piqua have cast ballots.

Traditionally, Piqua has had abysmal voter turnout. Take last August’s Issue 1 election. That election had over 31,000 voters in the county cast a ballot and the turnout was 42%. The community had only one precinct had a turnout over 45% and there were even two precincts where the turnout was less than 20%.

It will be interesting to see if these numbers change and shift as early voting remains a popular option for voters wishing to cast their ballot.

What Do You Think?

Have you already voted? What was your experience? Do these numbers surprise you? Our paid subscribers are welcome to provide their ideas and insights in the comment thread!

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