How Was Voter Turnout? Depends Who You Ask

If you were a poll worker in Easton Tuesday, it was a good day to catch up on your reading. Or in the case of one worker at a downtown polling place, your knitting.

Whether it was disinterest in the primary election, gloomy weather or a combination of the two, many polling places around the city had seen fewer than 150 voters by Tuesday evening. 

Depending on who you asked, that was either pretty good, for a primary, or very bad.

At the Easton Area Community Center on Washington Street, 115 people had voted just after 6 p.m. A few more, and the 7th ward would hit 25 percent turnout.

"That's the best I can remember," for a primary, said Jim Edinger, judge of elections for the ward. 

Election workers on the South Side and Downtown reported similar results.

Meanwhile, the polling place at the College Hill Presbyterian Church had seen fewer than 300 voters by 6:30 p.m., a "horrible" turnout, said judge of elections Mary Visconi.

Typically, a primary will attract 500 to 600 voters in that part of the city, she said.

Even this year's big ticket election item, , wasn't drawing that many people out. Visconi said many voters were confused by the way the ballot question is written.

"The wording is so poor," she said, even after the county posted a "plain English" version at polling places.

"One woman just asked 'If I want to sell it, what do I vote?'" Visconi said.

According to unofficial results, just 3,092 people voted for the candidates, the only contested city-wide race on the ballot.