How does early voting this year compare with recent years? Here's a 2003-2009 comparison - the odd years when we have municipal elections. EVPA stands for Early Voting by Personal Appearance. The mail column shows mail ballots returned to the Harris County Clerk to date. Total to date is EVPA+Mail. Totals are for seven days of early voting - Monday-Sunday:
| Year | EVPA | Total to date | |
| 2003 | 26752 | 3558 | 30310 |
| 2005 | 23778 | 1715 | 25493 |
| 2007 | 16092 | 3555 | 19647 |
| 2009 | 26662 | 3804 | 30466 |
Keep in mind, these numbers are for the entirety of Harris County. Take about 75% of that and you have an estimate of the City of Houston numbers.
What was the final turnout in 03, o5 and o7 for Harris County? The second, third and fourth columns are the totals for early voting in person, early voting by mail, final early vote. The fifth column is the final total, including early voting plus Election Day.
| Year | Final EVPA | Final EV Mail | Total EV | Final Total |
| 2003 | 75285 | 17583 | 92868 | 374549 |
| 2005 | 72361 | 10703 | 83064 | 332154 |
| 2007 | 43420 | 6844 | 50264 | 193945 |
Kuff has more on weekend voting. You can see that early voting to date actually tracks a little higher than in 2003, the last open mayoral election. I'll be very surprised if the 2009 final total is anywhere near the 2003 total, but who knows.
There are eight days until Election Day, which is plenty of time for dirty tricks (dirty trickster Republican consultant Blakemore is helping Locke), more about who is buying the election (Locke with his insider lobbyist donations or Brown with his self-financed race), and dividing up the black vote even further. Perhaps even Roy Morales will will draw the fed up Republican vote his way. In a head to head with Melissa Noriega in Nov. 2007, he got 34% of the vote. That's 34% hardcore R who have to go somewhere by Nov. 3rd - or stay home.
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