Springfield Election Tallies
by Bill Dusty
This year’s Presidential election season was historic for a few reasons: The American people elected the first African-American president; The Republican Party nominated a woman for vice president for the first time; Voter registration and turn-out reached record-breaking numbers.
Here in Springfield, the numbers were both predictable and eyebrow-raising. The most recent estimate of the city’s population, as pegged by a 2005 Amercian Community Survey (ACS), was 146,948 (this number does not include individuals residing in institutions). That same survey counted residents aged 17 or younger at 40,127. According to the City of Springfield website, the total number of people registered to vote this year was 84, 538, out of which 50,415 actually took the time to vote. Last year’s registered voter count was 78,796.
That would leave only an estimated 22,283 people aged 18 or over residing in Springfield who are not registered to vote. In a city with historically low voting numbers and predictably poor voter turnouts, this small number of non-registered voters is at the very least noticeable, if not remarkable. Why do so many people take the time to register to vote, only to fail to show up on voting day?
In the Presidential election, the Obama/Biden ticket received 38,228 votes to the McCain/Palin tally of 10,976. This was a predictable thumping in light of a.) Springfield’s high minority population, and b.) the large new-registration numbers, which were largely due to folks wanting to vote for Obama.
Senator John Kerry similarly crushed his opposition despite having a decidedly poor opinion rating in Western Massachusetts. He chalked up 37,165 votes to challenger Jeff Beatty’s 8,082 and challenger Bob Underwood’s 2,391. Kerry’s vote total suggests he benefited greatly from the outflow of voters who showed up for Obama.
Richard Neal ran unopposed this year but still managed to rake in 41,561 votes. Over forty thousand Springfield residents, out of a total of 50,000 who actually voted, actually took the time to connect the arrow for a candidate who had no opposition. How indicative is that of the knee-jerk Democrat voting habits that so many people practice in these parts?
With the exception of Sean Curran, who received 10,569 votes, none of the candidates for state Representative reached the 10,000 vote mark. State Representative James T. Welch, running unopposed, managed to get 743 people interested in voting for him (barely beating Neal’s “write-in” opposition number of 712). Meanwhile, Ben Swan, who won his election back in September’s preliminary election and who ran unopposed on November 4th, actually received more votes than state Representative Cheryl Coakley-Rivera, who did have a challenger (George Vazquez). Swan racked up 9,545 votes in his non-contest compared to Rivera’s 6,733 votes in her winning effort.
So ends another boringly predictable election cycle here in the Happy Valley of western Massachusetts. As usual, the Democrat candidates steamrolled into power – or back into power – with little effort, reinforcing the assertion that the only way politicians in these parts leave office is when they choose to leave.
Or if they’re arrested.
Sources:
- Epodunk Population Overview: Springfield
- Springfield City Hall – 2008 Election Results
- Springfield City Hall – 2007 Election Results
PDF 2 Responses for “Springfield Election Tallies”
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Is there any way we can find out how people voted through ward and precinct?
p.s. I confess to being one of those Write-In opposition votes to Neal. I voted for John Lysak.
I’m not sure of the City website has that info up yet. I believe they may in the future.