We are less than a week out from this year’s municipal elections. Typically, these elections attract fewer voters than years when people are voting for president or for members of the U.S. Congress and their state officials, such as governor and state representatives and senators.
It is not as if Americans, Bristolites included, turn out in record numbers for any election, either. Comparatively speaking, the number of voters in our elections do not quite measure up to other places in the world.
According to the Council on Foreign Relations article from mid-2022 on voter turnout in democracies, United States ranks ninth with 62 percent in presidential election years and lower in mid-year elections.
In Connecticut, in odd years such as this, there are no elections for higher office, neither president, U.S. representatives or senators, governor nor state representatives or senators.
Even when higher offices are on the ballot, the numbers are less than impressive. In 2018, for instance, when seats in Congress and state representatives and state senators were open, 63.3 percent of voters showed up at the polls. In 2014, when the same offices were open, 43.9 percent of voters showed up. In 2010, 56.5 percent showed.
Municipal elections, according to the Office of the Connecticut Secretary of State, the numbers for municipal elections are dismal: 2011, 23.8 percent; 2013, 24.4 percent; 2015, 23.3 percent; 2017, 20.6 percent; 2019, 22.5 percent.
There are many reasons voters do not make it to the polls, and in the past few years, these have become more apparent, especially on the national level. The use of voter IDs, early voting, working hours that keep a person from the polls, transportation issues and more often are raised as obstacles, and they are obstacles. Here in Bristol we try our best to address some of these. For instance, both parties offer rides to the polls. A person simply needs to reach out.
However, the saddest reasons for not voting among these for us here in Bristol has to do with voter disaffection. We would distinguish this from voter apathy. The latter is much too broad a term that carries with it a stigma that allows people who vote off the hook, literally, chastising people for not voting, when the reality is more complicated. Voter disaffection points to problems with our system where people find that how they vote does not make a difference to them and to the lives of the people around them, so they convince themselves that voting is not the answer.
Generally, speaking this attitude creates a situation of self-fulfilling prophecy. If a person who seeks change through voting does not vote, and another person does vote, does get out there and votes, who is going to get elected and who is going to end up making decisions and who will benefit? And the cycle begins again.
It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others. The benefit of democracy is that when it works best it engages everyone so that everyone gets a chance to weigh in with a vote.
Vote, and you may find out that what you thought might have been a wasted effort turns out to be what other people like you intended. Don’t vote and you might simply be engaging in the self-fulfilling prophecy that your vote doesn’t count and never find out that there are others with the same goals and interests as you.
If you do vote, you know this. Keep at it, and maybe offer someone who might not vote the opportunity to drive with you to the polls on Nov. 7.
Incidentally, there have been some changes at the polls here in Bristol. District 3 voters, who had voted at the Elks Club now vote at the Bristol Arts and Innovation Magnet School. Other districts have been changed by a few streets, and you may have been redistricted. If this is the case, the registrars of voters would have sent a letter informing you of the change. If you are uncertain, a call to the registrars’ office is in order. Otherwise, if you show up at a polling place, the poll workers will redirect you to the correct polling place.
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