Mayoral race, pot not drawing early voters
A $4 million mayoral campaign and a statewide issue to legalize marijuana have not motivated Columbus voters to cast ballots.
That’s according to early voting and absentee ballots received by the Franklin County Board of Elections: As of 7 p.m. Thursday, 36,587 Columbus voters had absentee ballots and 14,419 absentee and early votes had been cast.
Compare that with the more than 540,800 registered voters in the city.
Statewide totals for early voting and absentee ballots
should be available as early as Monday, according to the Ohio secretary of state’s office.
Early voting has become the barometer to predict turnout. Officials from the mayoral campaigns of Zach Scott and Andrew Ginther both agree that turnout will be around 20 percent once Tuesday’s polling is done.
Some had expected that state Issue 3, which would legalize marijuana, would drive more voters — both for and against pot — to the polls.
This election also will decide the biggest transition in city leadership in at least two decades. Voters will choose a new mayor for the first time since 1999, and there are five seats up for election on the seven-member Columbus City Council.
None of that seems to be motivating voters, though.
“The presidential primaries have started so early, and there’s so much focus on 2016,” Bryan Clark, Ginther’s campaign manager, said on Wednesday. “I mean, it’s days before the election, and everyone is talking about a presidential-primary debate.”
Scott’s campaign said turnout is mostly by older, consistent voters.
“I think we are seeing more of a turnout of Republicans,” said Melissa Barnhart, Scott’s campaign strategist. “I thought the marijuana vote would be getting more Republicans to vote.”
The low turnout is sobering for the mayoral candidates. Combined, they have raised and spent more than $4 million on their campaigns. Ginther has accounted for $3 million of that.
There is still time to vote early. The elections board at 1700 Morse Rd. is open until 7 p.m. today. Voters also can cast absentee and in-person ballots from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday; 1 to 5 p.m. on Sunday; and 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Monday.
Elections officials said there has been a steady stream of voters the past few days, and they expect at least 1,000 votes cast per day up to Election Day on Tuesday, when voting precincts will be open from 6:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. There were plenty of elections clerks waiting to assist early voters on Wednesday
“It’s been a real steady level, and things have been going very smoothly for voters here,” said Ben Piscitelli, the elections board spokesman.
Tony Archulete, 75, of Columbus, was one of those who voted early on Wednesday.
“I feel like I need to vote so I have a right to complain if I want to,” he said right after walking out of the voting booth. “It’s important, I think, this time, since we will have a new man leading Columbus.”
Barnhart said the turnout reminds her of 2009, another municipal-election year when not many voters showed up to vote on the measure that legalized gambling in Ohio. She estimates that somewhere in the neighborhood of 130,000 votes will be cast this year, or about 24 percent turnout.
In 2013, the most recent off-year election, 18.4 percent of Columbus voters turned out to defeat the Columbus City Schools levy and elect city council members.
About 33 percent of eligible voters turned out in 1999, when Mayor Michael B. Coleman won his first election.
An abysmal 9.3 percent of eligible voters in Columbus turned out for the May primary. Scott, who trailed Ginther by 34 percentage points, said after the primary he hoped for a significant increase in turnout by Nov. 3.