Everybody loves numbers and math, so SouthsideCentral is debuting our NumbersCentral category. If a story can be told by charts, graphics, and numbers, we’ll show the information to you that way. Today’s edition is about the anemic voter turnout in Danville’s recent municipal elections…
19.02% of Danville’s registered voters cast ballots on Tuesday, but some precincts had a much higher turnout than others. Let’s do a BreakDown on where the interest was.
168 voters cast absentee ballots, so they’re not counted as voting at a precinct. I’m quite surprised at the much-higher turnout for Forest Hills compared to the rest of the precincts.
Looking at these numbers, you may think that Forest Hills was the “key to victory” in this election but that’s not the case. Here’s the precincts ranked by the number of voters that turned out.
| 1st | 04 – Ballou Park | 617 |
| 2nd | 12 – American Legion | 532 |
| 3rd | 13 – Grove Park | 493 |
| 4th | 11 – Bonner | 432 |
| 5th | 16 – Park Avenue | 425 |
| 6th | 17 – Coates | 412 |
| 7th | 15 – Schoolfield | 341 |
| 8th | 10 – Woodberry | 318 |
| 9th | 05 – Forest Hills | 288 |
| 10th | 02 – Museum | 212 |
| 11th | 08 – GLH Johnson | 211 |
| 12th | 07 – Salvation Army | 204 |
| 13th | 09 – Glenwood | 186 |
| 14th | 03 – Langston | 182 |
| 15th | 18 – Absentee | 168 |
| 16th | 06 – Stonewall | 157 |
| 17th | 01 – Doyle Thomas Park | 124 |
| 18th | 14 – Gibson | 77 |
Forest Hills delivered the highest percentage of voters but was only in ninth place based on the number of voters delivered.
We’ll continue to analyze these election numbers as well as any other numbers that we find interesting in our NumbersCentral category here on SouthsideCentral.
Fascinating.
Why does Danville have only at-large seats for City Council???????
At least one person believes strongly the use of at-large seats is about diluting the voting power of African Americans:
http://www.protectcivilrights.org/pdf/voting/VirginiaVRA.pdf
Of course, my understanding is that Danville is now majority African American (which does not mean the voter rolls reflect that change). If the Voting Rights Act’s pre-clearance provision still contained Virginia, it is conceivable that a plan to district the city would actually be objected to. Who knows? Election law is not close to my specialty, but you asked an interesting question so I looked into it. I’m not taking any position on the issue.