{"id":90020,"date":"2015-10-06T23:52:31","date_gmt":"2015-10-07T05:52:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=90020"},"modified":"2015-10-06T23:53:04","modified_gmt":"2015-10-07T05:53:04","slug":"low-voter-turnout-is-becoming-the-norm-what-can-we-do-about-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2015\/10\/low-voter-turnout-is-becoming-the-norm-what-can-we-do-about-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Low voter turnout is becoming the norm. What can we do about it?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Albuquerque<\/a>

Will Keightley \/ Creative Commons<\/p>

Albuquerque at sunset. (photo cc info<\/a>)<\/p><\/div>\n

Voter turnout in Tuesday’s Albuquerque municipal election was 8.24 percent — a historically low percentage\u00a0that follows\u00a0a state and national trend.<\/p>\n

City Clerk Natalie Howard reportedly\u00a0said\u00a0that might be the lowest turnout in a municipal election in Albuquerque ever<\/a>. So turnout, not the unsurprising results of the city council races or various tax, bond and ballot questions<\/a>, is the story of the 2015 Albuquerque election.<\/p>\n

“They’ll wait hours in line for the Balloon Fiesta but won’t wait a little to vote,” Randy Perraglio of Espa\u00f1ola complained\u00a0during discussions NMPolitics.net facilitated on Facebook<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Alright, blame voters.<\/p>\n

“But blame the lack of leadership too,” Kyle Armstrong of Corrales wrote<\/a>. “The mayor couldn’t be bothered to even take a position<\/a> on the most ‘controversial’ measure on the whole ballot. Complacency seems to be the mood of the state, and the one thing we have in abundance is politicians unwilling or incapable of trying to actually do anything of note.”<\/p>\n

The truth is voter turnout has been dropping across America. Last year’s midterm congressional elections saw\u00a0the lowest turnout<\/a>\u00a0in 72 years\u00a0at 36.3 percent<\/a>. New Mexico was just above that national average in 2014, at about\u00a040 percent<\/a>. The United States trails almost all other developed nations<\/a> in voter turnout.<\/p>\n

“People are fed up with government and feel with all the corruption it doesn’t matter who wins,” Jim Simonin of Las Cruces wrote on Facebook<\/a>. “However, my wife and I vote in every election!”<\/p>\n

Turnout was 12 percent<\/a> in Albuquerque in 2011 — the last time the city council seats up for grabs on Tuesday were on the ballot. Turnout\u00a0was 20 percent in 2013, when there was a mayoral race.<\/p>\n

The trend is similar\u00a0in Las Cruces. Turnout\u00a0has fallen\u00a0the last three times\u00a0the mayor’s office has been\u00a0up for grabs\u00a0— from\u00a029 percent in 2003 to 18.86 percent in 2011. With a mayoral contest on the ballot again next month<\/a>, many expect turnout to continue to drop.<\/p>\n

“The extreme factions of both parties have hijacked the political world and voters are staying away in droves as a result,” wrote<\/a> Kent Simpson of Tucson, who used to live in\u00a0Las Cruces. “Just take a look at the surge in those leaving both R & D to become independents in the past decade.”<\/p>\n

The nationwide surge in registered independents is real<\/a>. New Mexico has one of the higher\u00a0percentages of registered independents in the nation at 19\u00a0percent<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“The public has grown tired of the ‘two-party’ deception,” John Lanning of Deming wrote on Facebook<\/a>. “It really doesn’t matter which party you vote for any more, because they are both filled with the same pre-selected people.”<\/p>\n

What do to?<\/h3>\n

As NMPolitics.net has\u00a0previously reported<\/a>, self-financing has characterized the Nov. 3 Las Cruces election thus far.\u00a0The heavy reliance on self-funding comes as the city council is considering implementing a\u00a0public financing system<\/a>\u00a0for\u00a0elections beginning in 2017.<\/p>\n

Proponents say public financing would increase participation<\/a> by forcing candidates to collect\u00a0lots of small donations from voters in order to qualify to receive\u00a0public funds.\u00a0That would lead to more engagement between candidates and voters, they argue.<\/p>\n

But NMPolitics.net has\u00a0analyzed\u00a0elections with public financing systems in Albuquerque and Santa Fe and discovered it’s not clear<\/a> that public financing increases voter turnout. It’s too early to add Tuesday’s data from Albuquerque into that analysis.<\/p>\n

Claudia Anderson of Farmington mentioned mail-in ballots as another\u00a0idea to improve turnout.<\/p>\n

“Mail voting has worked in Washington State for a number of years now,” Anderson wrote\u00a0on Facebook<\/a>. “I’m surprised more states haven’t considered it.”<\/p>\n

The New York Times wrote after 2014’s dismal nationwide turnout\u00a0that there’s some evidence mail ballots help<\/a>:<\/p>\n

There was one useful lesson: When voting is made easier, more people vote. Colorado switched to a mail ballot system this year, and it had the fourth-highest turnout in the nation, substantially larger<\/a> than in 2010. (It had a highly competitive Senate race, but did much better than many states with equally hot races.) Oregon, which also votes by mail, had the fifth-highest turnout, and Washington State, with a similar system, did better than the national average, though it had no major statewide races.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Emily Melancon of Albuquerque also called for better use of technology, writing on Facebook<\/a> that elections should “be promoted more prominently on social media. Written press just doesn’t cut it in this day and age.”<\/p>\n

State Rep. Javier Mart\u00ednez, D-Albuquerque, tweeted<\/a> that New Mexico needs to allow same-day and online voter registration. “I’ll work on this,” he wrote.<\/p>\n

Consolidating elections<\/h3>\n

Former Do\u00f1a Ana County Chief Deputy Clerk Mario O. Jimenez III wrote a column<\/a> for NMPolitics.net in June arguing that smaller elections should be consolidated.<\/p>\n

“We often read editorials and reports on low voter turnout for a school board<\/a>, bond, hospital or other type of ‘minor’ election. Sadly, the majority of voters are hearing about these elections for the first time, resulting in their inability to participate,” Jimenez wrote.<\/p>\n

But consolidating such elections into one would generate more buzz and increase turnout, Jimenez\u00a0argued. Recent efforts<\/a> at the Roundhouse to pass a consolidation bill have failed.<\/p>\n

But it’s an idea some\u00a0brought up during\u00a0Tuesday night’s Facebook discussion on turnout for the Albuquerque election.<\/p>\n

“Here in Santa Fe we had an election for the community college board, then a few weeks later an election for something else,” wrote<\/a> Kimberly Fries Walker. “Why, oh why aren’t they coordinated?”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Voter turnout in Tuesday’s Albuquerque municipal election was 8.24 percent — a historically low percentage that follows a state and national trend.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":66499,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[139],"class_list":["post-90020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-albuquerque","prominence-top-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90020"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90020\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66499"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}