Early voting surpasses 2014 mayor’s race
Two-thirds of more than 3,400 ballots cast citywide are from Districts 1, 2
More than halfway through the early voting period in the March 6 municipal election, Santa Fe voters have already surpassed the early voting totals from the 2014 mayor’s race, though the rate of turnout is well off the pace of the 2017 sodatax special election.
An analysis of early voting turnout data obtained through a public records request reflects the heightened public interest in the fiveway race to become the city’s first full-time mayor as well as three contested City Council races. But the numbers also suggest that an earth-shattering turnout, such as was seen in the hotly contested single-issue special election of last year, is not in the cards.
Through Monday, 3,403 city residents had cast early ballots, two-thirds of whom were residents of Districts 1 and 2, the north and southeast sides.
Those two districts consistently turn out to vote at the highest and second-highest rates, respectively, of the city’s four districts. Collectively, they have accounted for 57 percent of the votes cast in the past three Santa Fe mayoral elections, dating to 2006.
District 2 voters through Monday were only 18 votes behind District 1, perhaps underscoring the enthusiasm over the threeway race for an open District 2
council seat between lawyer Carol Romero-Wirth and businessmen Joe Arellano and Nate Downey.
District 4, the south-central home turf of City Councilor Ron Trujillo, had produced 888 early voters — 26 percent of the total citywide early vote. That’s par for the course: District 4 has averaged 26 percent of the total city turnout over the past three mayoral races.
The far southwest side District 3 — perennially the city’s laggard in voter turnout — had only 237 early voters through Monday. Roman “Tiger” Abeyta is running unopposed for the district’s open council seat.
Mayoral candidate and entrepreneur Alan Webber, who has campaigned with Abeyta in the southwest district that includes Tierra Contenta and Airport Road, said he suspects low early turnout there won’t necessarily mean low turnout overall. “Some people love to vote on election day,” he said. “It’s a tradition. If people in [Districts] 1 and 2 are demographically older, more retired folks, they may have the luxury of going in early.”
With three days left to cast an early vote, the pre-election day turnout is unlikely to come anywhere near the remarkable numbers drawn by the sugary-beverage special election, which saw 7,812 early votes, or almost 40 percent of the total vote.
With community passions inflamed and cash pouring in from special interest groups on both sides, that election, in which voters rejected the tax proposal, set a record for turnout overall.
Although every district across the city turned out at a higher-than-normal rate in that contest, south-side voters in particular stood out for practically sprinting to the polls: Forty-five percent of those who voted in District 4 cast ballots early, well ahead of any other of the city’s districts. Almost 70 percent of District 4 voters were against the tax.
“With the sugar tax, in my opinion, it brought out a lot of people where you sometimes don’t get a high turnout,” said Trujillo, who became the public face of the successful opposition to the tax. “My hope is that those same people stay engaged and do come out and vote in this election.”
Asked whether he expected that sustained enthusiasm to drive south-side turnout, Trujillo said his focus was high turnout from Trujillo voters citywide.
In the three-way 2014 mayor’s race won by Javier Gonzales, only 2,298 city residents voted early, representing 13.5 percent of the total turnout (in that contest, early voting was only available at one location).
According to the 2018 early vote data, 370 absentee ballots had been returned through Monday.
As of Tuesday, there were 54,152 registered voters within the city, according to the County Clerk’s Office. Registration books for the city election closed Feb. 6.
Early voting continues through Friday at the City Clerk’s Office at the Genoveva Chavez Community Center. Election day is March 6.