Tucson, Arizona Thursday, 4 July 2002
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By Rhonda Bodfield
ARIZONA DAILY STAR
Political observers are watching to see whether a host of election reforms will reverse a longstanding decline in voter interest in Arizona.
Campaign signs are starting to go up for this year's round of elections. We'll elect a new governor and a new congressional representative. The Legislature is again up for grabs.
And if current trends hold, it's almost a given that the majority of Arizonans won't show up at the polls.
But some see signs of hope.
Bob Grossfeld, a Tempe-based pollster, said despite the age-old grumbling about disenfranchised voters, there could be a change this year.
"This year, unlike any recent election I can think of, a number of the complaints people register have been resolved," he said.
"People complain there's nobody to vote for, but this year, there's a record number of candidates," he said. "People complain that special interests control everything, but with Clean Elections, there's less of that than there's ever been before.
"As these great big excuses are taken away, if people don't vote what they're going to be left with is that they just don't care."
Arizona has 3.9 million adult residents. Of those, 2.1 million, or 57 percent, are actually registered.
In the last three elections that didn't have a presidential race - like this one - voter turnout for the November general election averaged 54 percent. Just 51 percent of registered voters cast ballots in 1998, for example, the same year voters agreed to keep first-time drug offenders out of jail and provide public money for political campaigns.
Without the buzz of ballot initiatives, the September primary is always worse. The average turnout for the last three primaries in nonpresidential years was 25 percent of registered voters.
It's too early to tell whether voters will ratchet up participation this year. But Pima County Recorder F. Ann Rodriguez said she's concerned that residents don't know who represents them, what their views are or even what they do.
She recently asked applicants for an upper-level job to name a host of politicians. They got the governor. They were fine with U.S. Sen. John McCain. They stumbled on the county supervisors, with most giving that title to County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry.
"If someone working within the government structure doesn't know, what's happening with someone out there who works at a car lot or in a sales job and doesn't deal with government?" Rodriguez said.
"What people don't understand is that in one way or another, they all impact your life through your pocketbook. And they only get their power by those who show up and vote for them."
Americans are clearly conflicted about voting. The U.S. Census Bureau since 1964 has called people in the days after every presidential election to see if they voted and why. Report authors caution their result will not match any official numbers because it inevitably shows more people voting than actually voted, a discrepancy they chalk up to a reluctance among Americans to admit they aren't doing their civic duty, even to anonymous pollsters.
Voter registration
The Pima County Recorder's Office is taking requests for early ballots, with
early voting starting Aug. 8. You have to be registered by Aug. 12 to participate
in the primary election. For more information, contact 740-4330.
Among those who copped to not voting in 2000, almost 37 percent said they were
too busy, or that they found voting inconvenient or they had an illness or an
emergency. About 12 percent said they weren't interested, another 7 percent
said they didn't like the candidates. A smattering said they forgot or had registration
and transportation problems. Some, like Jehovah's Witnesses, don't vote for
religious reasons.
Bill Mishler, who heads the political science department at the University of Arizona, hasn't voted since 1980 and tells his students so.
"The simple way to put it is, I wised up. Voting is not a rational way to try to influence political decisions," he said. "Time is limited. If you choose to vote, you're spending a scarce resource when you could be doing something else."
Mishler said he has done a cost-benefit analysis and has determined that he has no realistic chance of having his vote influence an election, noting there's never been a statewide election decided by one vote.
Meanwhile, he said, that hour he would have spent voting could be spent working to give money to a campaign, or asking friends to support a particular candidate.
He uses his choice as a teaching tool to prompt discussion.
Reaction varies from disapproval to amusement, and he gets at least one voter registration form during the semester.
"Some countries sanction people with fines if they don't vote," he said. "In this country, we apply sanctions in the form of guilt: 'What do you mean. you don't vote?' And when people do vote, we give those little 'I Voted' stickers like little gold stars. But I just feel voting is the least important form of participation."
There are elections in which a few votes would make a difference, with perhaps the best example being the last presidential race.
In 1992, a game of five-card stud determined who would represent a Phoenix-area legislative district in the general election after the primary candidates tied. In 1994, Pima County joined 12 others in choosing former Secretary of State Dick Mahoney to do battle with then-U.S. Rep. Jon Kyl for an open Senate seat. He lost the primary by 59 votes.
To counter apathy, political parties push get-out-the-vote efforts. Some would just as soon not try. "I don't want people voting who don't have a clue," said former state Sen. Peter Goudinoff.
He doesn't necessarily see low turnout as a sign of societal ill. "Many political scientists attribute that to the fact the government is doing fine. . . . The vast majority of people, they have a mortgage to pay and kids to raise, and they could care less."
There are other options. Some states have same-day registration and have turnout higher than the national average. Arizona, meanwhile, was among the lowest six states for voting rates in the 2000 Census survey.
Then there's Oregon, which in 2000 went to an entirely vote-by-mail system, in which every voter gets a ballot 14 days before the election. Oregon's primary in 2000 had 51 percent participation. This year it was 46 percent. Those numbers are twice Arizona's.
If you want to know who votes, it's a pretty simple recipe. White voters have the highest turnout. Those over 65 are the most consistent voters, with double the rates of those between 18 and 24.
Those with bachelor's degrees are twice as likely to vote as those who did not complete high school. The voting rate for people in families making at least $50,000 a year was 72 percent, compared with 38 percent of people making less than $10,000.
Local pollster Margaret Kenski has been analyzing votes for the upcoming election and has found that in some of the legislative districts, 80 percent of the people who vote regularly in the primaries are 51 and older.
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Alfredo Gutierrez is betting that he'll be helped by low turnout, even though he's bothered by it.
He's facing Attorney General Janet Napolitano, who is steamrolling the other candidates in the polls. Gutierrez has been targeting disaffected voters who haven't been voting.
Since so few voters participate in the primary, if he persuades even a relative few to show up at the polls, he has a chance, he figures.
But he also sees risk in the trend of nonparticipation.
"We started this country with a relatively small pool of people allowed to vote. The voting process was generally limited to white men who owned property," Gutierrez said. "In every instance, we've expanded that circle but we now find ourselves statistically going to the same place where we are ruled by a small class of the elite."
* Contact Rhonda Bodfield at 573-4240 or at rhondab@azstarnet.com
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