December 2012
2 posts
The Sugar City Mom Theory
At a post-election panel discussion sponsored by The Blue Review at the downtown Boise State University Center on Main, Idaho Statesman political reporter Dan Popkey stated his theory why the No votes prevailed striking down the three education reform measures:
“I think the reason the (hypothetical) Sugar City mom voted against these measures was because she knew her kids’ teachers...
Obama vote as the base of the "No on Proposition...
An earlier post identified the ticket splitting of Idaho voters, those who voted for Mitt Romney and then voted No on Propositions 1, 2 & 3 in the face of Republican establishment support for the ballot measures. A Romney Crossover Voter Probability for each county can be calculated as a function of the two variables below, and shows significant differences across the state as illustrated on...
November 2012
13 posts
Voter Turnout Inertia in 2012
Despite public and media attention to the school-related ballot initiatives and Mitt Romney as the first LDS member to lead a major party ticket, overall voter turnout on 2012 was down 1,216 votes in Idaho when compared with 2008.
For fifty years every presidential election year the numbers of voting age population has increased, as has the voting eligible population since they starting...
Considering Bronco Stadium Seating Expansion
A so-called great debate over Bronco Stadium breaks out as the seating capacity was increased this year to 37,000. This was followed by some of the highest-record attendance in stadium history. So should additional seating be planned for the facility?
Over the long term as stadium seating has increased, so has attendance. Even with this year’s expansion the attendance figures show the...
Support for the right to hunt, fish & trap more...
Idaho voters gave 73.3 percent approval to a constitutional amendment to protect the right to hunt, fish and trap. Of the 1.15 million Idahoans 18 years of age or older about 360,000 purchase a hunting or fishing license (or both).
Whether it’s friends, relatives or business associates of people who hunt or fish, or people who used to hunt and fish but no longer do, yet they support the...
LDS Membership, Romney Vote, and Ticket Splitting
Here are a series of scatterplots showing LDS membership, vote for Romney, comparisons with vote for McCain in 2008, relationship with voter turnout, Romney vote compared to the “No” vote on Proposition 1 (a measure of crossover voting or ticket splitting), and an indication of probability of crossover voting by Romney voters based on LDS membership by county.
For starters, here is...
Ticket-splitting makes a reappearance in Idaho
A subspecies of the Idaho voter, long thought extinct and not seen in 22 years made a brief reappearance last Tuesday.
Voters gave Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney 64 percent of the vote and then down the ballot supported the “no” votes on Proposition One and Two with about 58 percent of the vote. This is the first case of ticket-splitting since the 1990 election, a...
Romney's Overwhelming Idaho Victory Appears...
Republican Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney won Idaho’s four electoral votes with some 64 percent of the vote. This amount was an improvement over John McCain’s 61 percent in the 2008 election. But both of those percentages fall short of that of George W. Bush who racked up 67.2% and 68.4% in 2000 and 2004 respectively.
Idaho maintained 4th place for the percentage of Republican...
Voter Turnout Not So Great
The unofficial vote for President in Idaho totals 651,661, with Mitt Romney getting 420,390 ballots or 64.5 percent of the vote. He beats the 61.5% that John McCain earned, but McCain garnered his 403,012 votes out of a total 655,032 ballots.
Raw voter turnout is down about 3,500 votes.
Numbers are not yet available for total ballots cast and numbers of registered voters. But predictions of...
Proposition 1: An Opportunity to Wake Up the...
The 57 percent No vote on Proposition 1 bears a relationship to the 2006 school supporters’ sales tax initiative that fell short at 45 percent. With some exceptions many counties showed an increase of 13 percent or more in the vote supporting teachers’ contentions that the law should be overturned. Plot the percent of vote in the 44 counties from these two ballot measures six years...
Modern Record in Ballot Measure Participation...
Here is a day after observation from the unofficial results from the November 6 election on Idaho’s Propositions 1, 2 & 3. We measure voter participation by comparing total vote on the ballot measures as a percentage of the total vote in the Presidential election.
Ballot fatigue did not happen. Total votes compared to the participation in the Presidential race came in rating...
Propositions 1, 2 & 3 poised to promote voter...
Ballot measures (initiatives, referenda, constitutional amendments, advisory questions) are commonly regarded as additional elements to the reason most people may turn out to vote. Usually tacked on to the end of a ballot, they are subject to what is known as “ballot fatigue” where a voter gives up voting as they don’t want to take too much time in the voting booth.
But in some...
Benchmarking the No Vote on Props 1, 2 & 3
A previous post noted that while polling appears to favor some or all the NO campaign on Propositions 1, 2 & 3, there is still an uphill climb to achieve victory at the ballot box. Part of that is finding where the no votes will come from across the state.
After looking at some historic voting patterns this chart presents a benchmark for the percent of vote each county would need to achieve...
HIGH BAR: Prediction of 80 Percent Voter Turnout...
In late September Idaho Secretary of State Ben Ysursa predicted a voter turnout as high as 80 percent for the November election. Measured against the number of registered voters the 80% number has not been achieved since 1992. And prior to 1992 it had not been surpassed since 1972, when historic records show the 80% bar being passed every Presidential election year since 1960.
One factor that...
REALITY CHECK: Establishment Calls the Shots on...
Going into the 2012 election some polls show three referenda on the so-called school reform with at least two where the No vote is leading according to Mason-Dixon polling, or where all three the No vote is polling ahead. Opponents of these laws, mainly the Idaho Education Association and concerned parents may pull off the rare feat of taking on the establishment and actually winning. It does...
October 2012
2 posts
Predicting Voter Turnout from Historic Data
Using historic data on voter turnout rates in Idaho there appears a pretty strong relationship between the percentage increase in voter registration from the primary election to the general election and how that affects the voter turnout rate at the general election.
In fact the chart above shows a fairly strong relationship between the two variables. This makes sense because higher interest...
September 2012
2 posts
July 2012
1 post
An unconstitutional law that brought in maximum...
Lost in any of the discussion of a recent Idaho Supreme Court decision that found a 1990 law unconstitutional because it eliminated conflict auctions for cottage site leases on state endowment lands is this fact: revenue from cottage site leases has brought in an increasing amount of revenue in the past 20 years, and these revenues have outperformed those from grazing leases and timber sales.
...
May 2012
6 posts
A great and growing disengagement
First, the interstices’ projection of last week for a 24.2% turnout of voters was virtually on point with today’s official canvass of votes that came in at 24.4%. The chart below is updated with the Official result added:
An interstices projection of 756,538 registered voters was not that far off from the official 762,997. This means a decline in registered voters of only -3.5%...
"Idaho Democrats have a problem. They are...
Three days after the primary election the Kevin Richert blog posted an essay by Idaho GOP Rules Chairman Ronald Nate with the above quote as the lede, and this title “Idaho Democrats have a problem. They are bleeding support.”
Nate looked at the primary votes in 2008, 2010 and 2012 for US House races, both districts and both parties. He noted the Democratic Party turnout has...
Partial Results show Voter Turnout below even the...
The Board of Canvassers will meet May 30 to make official the 2012 primary election vote, one that has been subject of debate over the effect that the new closed primary law may have had on voter participation.
Idaho Secretary of State Ben Ysursa has predicted a 23 percent voter turnout. A 23 percent score would mark it as the lowest on record. This website last week showed that long-term data...
Estimating Voter Turnout Before It's Official
A day after the primary election, assertions were coming left and right about the voter turnout in the Idaho primary election and whether the closed primary law had any effect. Unfortunately the turnout data does not yet exist. But that does not stop the arguing about it here, here and here. The limited data available has led to some useful analysis here and here (and of course this tumblr...
Closed Primary a Chilling Effect on Democrats? No.
The 2012 Idaho primary election resulted in a 9 percent decrease in voters in the Democratic primary - 22,594 votes - the lowest on record. The previous lowest on record was in 2010 with 27,412 votes. This is less than half the high water mark of 1994 when 57,797 Democratic votes were cast in an Idaho Primary.
So did the new closed primary law have a chilling effect on turnout? Some news media...
April 2012
2 posts
March 2012
2 posts
Yet Another Less than Productive Legislative...
It may well be the $128 million dollar remodeled Statehouse effect: legislators and the Governor comfortable in their cushy digs and getting less work done. Or, it may be a long-term trend that continues where there ability to make decisions in a timely and efficient manner is a thing of the past.
Whatever the cause, the recently adjourned 2012 session of the Idaho Legislature appears to have...
January 2012
1 post
December 2011
3 posts
College Bowl Payouts Just Like America
The 2011-12 college football bowl games have started and there are 35 of them. The BCS games have a huge payout to the teams while most of the bowls put together a rather modest payout. The teams that play in the games don’t necessarily get rich in the process, in fact some schools and conferences actually lose money.
The distribution of payouts for each bowl game are divided the the...
July 2011
1 post
June 2011
2 posts
May 2011
1 post
April 2011
1 post
2011 Legislative Session Less Productive than 2010
The Legislative Productivity Index, first introduced in 2009, is updated to reflect the 2011 session. And the results show a less productive session than 2010, though better than the 2009 and 2003 sessions, both noted for the marathon struggles over taxes. If the 2011 session is a return to “normal” it does fit in the range showing a continued decline in productivity since the mid...
March 2011
1 post
On an Average Summer Day
Idaho Governor Butch Otter testified last week before the House Natural Resources Committee and claimed, “There are more people in one day, probably, that play golf on the floating green in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, than visit the Frank Church-River of No Return (Wilderness) in a year.”
The Idaho Statesman did a take down on Otter’s claim, showing that between river floating, hunting and...
February 2011
1 post
Vote for Governor: Where the needle moved on the...
After some number crunching on the Idaho Governor’s election there appears to be some patterns that help explain the shape of the Governor Otter reelection margin and it’s location. We earlier pointed out that Governor Otter seemed to benefit more among the counties that showed a larger increase in voter turnout rates.
While post-election analysis concluded Keith Allred’s Magic...
January 2011
1 post
Project 60 headed for 50
“Project 60 is a comprehensive initiative to grow Idaho’s Gross Domestic Product. Designed in three tiers to strengthen both rural and urban communities, the plan will create quality jobs for all Idahoans by fostering systemic growth, recruiting new companies to Idaho, and selling Idaho’s trade and investment opportunities to the world.”
The above statement from the...
December 2010
5 posts
Ada/Canyon Poised for another Legislative District
The Wednesday post showed the Idaho 2010 Census at 1,567,582 and a growth of 21 percent which is 4th highest in the nation. Seven counties outpaced the state growth rate with Teton County on top followed by Canyon, Madison, Jefferson, Kootenai, Ada and Bonneville.
The change in population at the county level can help feed speculation on the potential impact on the redistricting of the Idaho...
Population change by County - Early Estimates
The US Census released the 2010 population numbers for each state and for Idaho it’s 1,567,582. Population grew 21 percent since 2000. Nothing was provided except the statewide count, but from this information an early estimate of the changes in county population can be estimated. The basic approach is to assume:
2009 county population estimates are accurate, and
growth rates from 2009...
November 2010
6 posts
