The elephant in the room after Tuesday’s primary in Mecklenburg County is voter turnout only about half that of the rest of the state. County turnout was 7.3 percent, statewide turnout was about 14 percent.
Voters in Meck were bombarded by TV and radio ads for the 8th District GOP primary (even though just a sliver of the district is in the county), saw a raft of General Assembly incumbents face primary challengers, most for the first time ever, a contested sheriff’s race featuring an appointed incumbent in his first race, and had a stacked GOP county commission at-large ballot. And, so — basically nothing. There was no traction.
Now, one could look at the results and say, “Wow, 594,000 voters went to the polls and cast 43,000 ballots!” That compares favorably with 510,000 voters and 18,600 ballots cast in May 2006, an election which saw turnout of 3.6 percent. Yet go back to May 1998 and you find a 13 voter turnout. All you can really say is that politics runs very hot and cold in Mecklenburg. And in this year with a lot of heat statewide and nationally, local voters stayed pretty cool.
