Who’s minding the store? By KAREN KENNEDY Only 37 percent of Meade County’s registered voters – 6,213 voters out of a possible 15,851 registered Democrats and Republicans – turned out to vote in the Meade County Primary Election on May 16. To provide you with just a few more statistics, Meade County currently has 10,947 registered Democrats, 4,904 registered Republicans, and 1,059 registered as “other.” 8,196 registered voters are male, 8,713 registered voters are female. The total number of registered voters in Meade County is 16,910. Let’s spend a few minutes considering the following questions. Why was our voter turnout so poor? Are there specific reasons 63 percent of Meade County’s registered voters didn’t vote on May 16? Were these voters simply too busy? Was the new voting location inconvenient or are they harboring a grudge about the change in polling locations? Were they out of town during the primary? If so, did they know in advance they wouldn’t be in town? If they knew for whatever reason they couldn’t vote on primary day, why didn’t they make arrangements to vote absentee? Did they feel that a combination of work and evening commitments – perhaps scheduled activities with their children – prohibited them from voting? Do people think their vote doesn’t count? Do they dislike politics and want no part of it? Are they uninformed voters who decided there was no point in voting if they couldn’t place an intelligent vote? Did they not like the candidates from which they had to choose? Did they think this election was less important than the November election? Did they not vote in the primary, but they will vote in November? Or, are people simply apathetic? What can we as a community do to increase voter turnout? Could our local media do a better job educating and/or encouraging people to get out and vote? What about our Republican and Democrat parties? Did they do a good job encouraging voter turnout? What about the candidates themselves? Do you believe our candidates provided a clear picture of where they stand on the important issues? Or did you feel like they simply said, “Vote for me,” but you really weren’t clear on why you should vote for them? Readers, I’d love to hear more from you in this column. Quite honestly, I’m tired of hearing my own voice week after week, and I’d really like to know what you think. If you’d like to make your voice heard, I’m asking you to send me – either via e-mail or through the U.S. mail – a couple sentences or short paragraph explaining your theory on the low voter turnout and what we as a community can do to encourage more people to vote. Please include your name, phone number, and the town in which you live. Your comments will be published in “Store” anonymously – no names used. However, I need to know how to contact you if I have questions about what you wrote. And I’d like to perhaps include from what part of the county a comment has originated. If you think you’re not a “good writer,” don’t let that stop you from responding because fancy writing is not what this column is all about. We’re not here to impress anyone with flowery wording or $100 words. Instead, it’s all about putting information and ideas out there. I’ll clean up grammar and punctuation, if necessary, and perhaps paraphrase what you’ve written due to space limitations. Yet, the guts of what you’ve sent me will remain intact. If we receive a huge response, we may not be able to include everyone’s comments, but I’ll ensure there’s proper representation of all ideas and opinions. Here’s one final point to ponder. During the highly popular grand finale of the TV show American Idol, it was announced that 63 million people cast votes to determine the winner of this seasons’ show. It was also stated this was more votes than any United States president has ever received. 63 million votes received for American Idol contestants, yet our voter turnout in Meade County was only 37 percent. Gives you something to think about, doesn’t it? Got a topic you’d like to see discussed? Contact Karen Kennedy at 422-2155 or send an e-mail to messenger@bbtel.com. The Messenger will consider all topics and select those that best lend themselves to the column’s format. All comments in response to the column should be sent to the Messenger in the form of a Letter to the Editor.
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