Down River – Oct. 30, 2014
Why Don’t We Vote?
The numbers are appalling, from Clinton County to all across the country, fewer and fewer are bothering to vote.
And it turns out the United States is not alone.
The internet, as we know, can be a wonderful thing so I asked it this week for some voter percentage figures from Western Europe. Countries there too are in decline.
The voter turnout in last May’s European elections was something better than 42 percent and that figure was the lowest ever, in steady decline from the first such continent-wide elections which saw a 62 percent turnout in 1979.
But that May 42 percent turnout in Europe still looks better than what we’re producing here at home. The number of registered voters who went to the polls in Clinton County last November was a paltry 31 percent and that was an election highlighted by numerous local contests.
That 31 percent November number actually looks pretty good compared to this past May when 17 percent of those eligible voted; granted there wasn’t much on the ballot this spring, but we did have Renovo’s own Tom Tarantella in a Democratic primary contest for Congress and a ton of Democratic candidates running for that party’s nomination for governor.
Any ideas? Is Joe Q. Six-Pack turned off by the continuing stalemates in Harrisburg and Washington? He’d rather stay at home than finding and supporting an alternative to the same legislators who get re-elected and re-elected time after time despite polls showing these same lawmakers are held in collective low esteem? Despite government’s growing propensity to “kick the can down the road” on issues large and small?
Whose fault is it we don’t vote? We say here all too often, if you don’t vote, don’t complain. But more and more of you are not voting, not even complaining, just watching brainless fare on TV (sporting events excluded).
Feeling better for having written that last paragraph, let me encourage the 20,381 eligible county voters to go to the polls next Tuesday and make your choices. If you do, then you will be allowed to complain and still watch brainless fare on your television.
Speaking of Numbers, Here Are Some:
1 – If the pollsters are correct, it will be 1 and out for Gov. Tom Corbett next Tuesday. He would make a record of some sorts, the first Pennsylvania governor not to earn two terms since the system was changed to allow such succession back in 1970.
Since that time we’ve seen Democrat Milton Shapp for two terms, Republican Dick Thornburgh for two terms, Democrat Bob Casey Sr. for two terms, Republican Tom Ridge for two terms and Democrat Ed Rendell for two terms.
It will be remarkable if Corbett doesn’t make it, given he has handsome Republican Party majorities in both the state Senate and House.
But what he hasn’t shown has been the ability to work with his party leadership in both chambers to come up with substantive accomplishments in matters ranging from the growing need for pension reform to the privatization of the state store system. Since Corbett can’t get it done with his own party in power, his likely ouster next Tuesday should come as no surprise…
3 – The number of Clinton County municipalities where between 6.3 and 11.5 percent of the population has trouble understanding English (no WalMart customer jokes here, please).
The municipalities are, you guessed it, those with the heaviest concentration of Amish, Logan and Greene Townships in Sugar Valley and Lamar Township in Nittany Valley.
What it means is, according to some bureaucrat in Washington or someplace, information on seeking Community Development Block Grant money must be posted in German on municipal buildings. Wait until Sean Hannity gets hold of this one…
? – That’s the number the county has to pony up to cover the cost of an outside audit of the county payroll books because of miscues over a recent couple year period in the payroll department.
The county commissioners recently said that audit has been completed but they have yet to release what the price tag will be. When the glitch was first discovered they anticipated the audit would not cost more than $80,000 and they were hopeful it would be considerably less…
4,041 – That’s the most recent enrollment figure available for the Keystone Central School District, a number far less than the better than 8,000 students enrolled back in the 1980s.
More information relative to the current enrollment (charter school, cyber-school, home-schooled, etc) is likely to be disseminated at the November school board meeting, a request for such info flowing from a couple board members at the October meeting.
A quick glance at those numbers shows a continuation of a declining enrollment trend seen at many school districts across the country: Whereas the district’s two high schools graduated 360 students last June, they have been replaced by a collective kindergarten class of 288, a drop of 72 students…
6 – The over-under on the number of votes Keystone Central superintendent Kelly Hastings gets as the 9-member school board votes at that same November meeting on offering her a second five-year term.
