San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
EVEN WITH 1.6M BALLOTS CAST, SOME NEIGHBORHOODS FALL BEHIND
In some areas of county, turnout as low as 59% to 65%
A record number of San Diego County voters participated in the general election this year, about 1.6 million, but voter participation in some areas, such as City Heights and some southeastern San Diego neighborhoods, remained low despite concentrated get-outthe-vote efforts.
Voter turnout — or the percent of registered voters who actually voted — was 83.5 percent countywide. That’s two-tenths of a percentage point below the record turnout of 83.7 percent set when President Barack Obama won his first presidential term in 2008.
Yet more than a quarter of precincts in San Diego County reported turnout below 80 percent, according to an analysis of election results by precinct. (The analysis excluded precincts with no registered voters.)
On the low end, precincts representing the neighborhoods of Chollas View, Mountain View, Valencia Park and Mount Hope — all in southeastern San Diego — reported voter turnout ranging from 59 percent to 65 percent.
In one precinct — just south of state Route 94 and bordering Interstate 805 in Lincoln Park — nearly 1,400 people, or 40 percent of the 3,500 registered voters, did not cast a ballot.
Voter turnout can be skewed in areas with a low number of registered voters. But even in some more populated areas in southeastern San Diego and San Ysidro, participation was still low for a presidential race, data from the San Diego County Registrar of Voters Office shows.
Logan Heights resident Marco Cisnero voted as he has for the past five years, because he feels it’s his civic duty. He said low voter turnout in his community could be a result of people feeling as if their voice doesn’t matter, because politicians often end up doing the opposite of what voters want.
“They don’t realize that they’re the ones who actually vote for those people,” he said. “So if they were to actually vote for the person that they believe in, they can start to see the changes they want to see.”
In a Mountain View precinct, some 40 percent of the 6,200 people registered to vote did not cast a ballot. Myron Taylor, who chairs a planning group in Mountain View, Logan Heights and Shelltown, said he wasn’t surprised.
“It’s kinda hard to put your finger on it,” Taylor said. “Some families don’t feel comfortable engaging in the political arena.”
The Mountain View community lacks access to services and technology, he said, and some families face language barriers and or have family members who are not citizens, so those who are eligible to vote are cautious about registering or doing anything involving the government.
In one San Ysidro precinct, 64 percent of the more than 8,000 registered voters cast a ballot, the data show. Advocates who spent several months going door to door in the South Bay said that has been a historical pattern there, despite coordinated efforts to remedy the problem.
Nonprofit health provider San Ysidro Health this year led a voter outreach campaign during the primary and general elections focusing on low-income, minority neighborhoods in San Ysidro, Chula Vista and National City.
Ana Melgoza, vice president of external affairs for San Ysidro Health, said nonprofit groups can only do so much; it’s important also that campaigns and the county’s registrar of voters evaluate ways to reach and educate residents who don’t vote regularly.
“It’s going to take more than a sign on a corner of a busy thoroughfare to get someone incentivized to vote,” Melgoza said. “That’s actually somewhat passive campaigning and ineffective, and the numbers show that.”
Alejandra
Perez, a spokeswoman with San Ysidro Health, said the Registrar of Voters should partner with nonprofits that are trusted messengers in hard-to-reach communities. That could mean placing drop box locations at health clinics, she said.
Low voter turnout has serious implications in communities, Melgoza said, noting that areas with low voter turnout are also areas that have been heavily impacted by COVID-19.
“It’s not rocket science to see that where there’s areas of underinvestment, you end up getting the results that you’re getting,” Melgoza said.
While turnout was low in select areas throughout the county, election results show nearly 30 percent of precincts reported a turnout of 90 percent or more.
All but six of the 39 precincts representing Carlsbad reported a voter turnout of 90 percent or more. One precinct, in the La Costa area of southern Carlsbad, reported a turnout of 96 percent — the highest in the county among precincts with 100 or more registered voters.
The 11 precincts representing Rancho Bernardo recorded about 92 percent of the 31,200 registered voters cast a ballot.
In Coronado, 89 percent of the more than 9,400 registered voters participated in the election.
In three precincts in La Jolla, just 2,000 people out of some 27,000 registered voters failed to cast a ballot.
Jim Clark, who has lived in Rancho Bernardo for more than 30 years, said it is likely that there was high turnout in his community because many residents are older and retired.
“You get people who have the time and interest to stay involved,” Clark said, adding that if people feel prepared they often are more compelled to participate.
Clark, a registered Republican, said he votes because he believes it is his duty. He voted by mail, as he has for years.
lauryn.schroeder @sduniontribune.com andrea.lopezvillafana @sduniontribune.com