When You Get the Chance – Will You Sit it Out or Dance? The Majority sat it out. Well, last Tuesday, May 12, 2015 was the Perth Amboy Special City Council Election – last seat. There was a winner, but only by numbers. In all honesty, and this is my OWN opinion – BOTH candidates LOST.
When you check the statistics from the November 12, 2014 election where 7 candidates were vying for 3 seats on the Council, there was a larger voter turnout. With this do over on May 12, 2015 with only 2 candidates on the ballot, I truthfully expected a blowout for the victor. Instead it was dust in the wind. To top it off, there were actually more registered voters added between the 2014 election and the one held in 2015.
In November 4, 2014, Sergio Diaz had 1810 votes from the machine vs. 1298 votes that he received in May 12, 2015. (-512 votes) For the Vote-By-Mail in 2014, he had 421 votes vs. 78 votes in 2015. (-343) For the Provisionals Diaz had 55 votes as compared to 30 in 2015. (-25)
Fernando Gonzalez had 1596 votes in November 4, 2014 by machine vs. 1273 votes in May 12, 2015 (-323 votes). In 2014 he had 633 Vote-By-Mail vs. 215 in May 2015 (-418 votes). For Provisionals he had 67 in 2014 vs. 40 in 2015. (-27)
In 11/4/14 there were 25,052 registered voters and 4907 voted on the machine (20%). In May 12, 2015 the number of registered voters increased to 25,156 (+104). On the machine 2571 voted (10% of Registered Voters).
My question is: “What happened to the supporters you had in 2014? How did you manage to actually lose votes instead of gaining?” I’ve noticed there was a candidate from 2014 who didn’t win who was supporting one of the two candidates in the May 12, 2015 election. You think that losing Candidate would encourage the people who supported him to vote for you. What happened?
Well, the BIG WINNER was the candidate under the banner: I DON’T CARE WHO WINS! It’s always good to have a balanced Council. You always need someone to question the issues. That’s a good thing. But, my father would always say, “If you criticize something, you should have some sort of solution or idea on how to solve the problem.”
Residents have spoken that there are a lot of political favors being handed out.
Term limits are a solution. Citizens can petition to have all offices subject to term limits by petition. People might argue that sometimes terms of service are too short. Maybe extend the amount of years for a term, but limit the amount of terms that can be served consecutively. It definitely is worth looking into.
We have people that come up and have talked about making Perth Amboy into Partisan or a Ward System. Talk is cheap. Why don’t you go into action and get a petition going? Have residents sign it to get term limitations on the ballot.
In last week’s paper we reported about an election that took place in 1950 in Perth Amboy where 18,299 people voted. In 1954, 18,330 people went to the polls. There were 20 candidates with the top vote getter receiving 8535 votes with a low vote of 3715 at the bottom of the totem pole. I don’t know if absentee ballots and provisional ballots were implemented back then, but a greater percentage had to actually make an effort to go to the polls.
Remember it’s Memorial Day on Monday, May 25, 2015. And is this how we honor those who make the ultimate sacrifice? By staying home and not being heard by refusing to vote, especially when we make it so convenient. It’s so sad. People in other countries are dying for this right that we take for granted.
C.M. & K.M.
