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Editorial: The $4 million voter
Op-Ed · November 12, 2015
We’ve all heard it preached around election time: Every utility bill counts.
Or is that every vote?
This year, one vote, counted late, changed the outcome of a $4 million parks improvement referendum.
We heard it said that the guy who cast the provisional ballot cast a potentially $4 million vote. And, in a sense, he did, given a bit of literary license.
But everyone who voted in favor of the referendum, which will make various improvements to West Branch-area parks, did the same. Of the 403 votes cast, a single voter did not carry the weight of the entire referendum on his ballot, otherwise this would not be a democracy.
It is easy to say that one vote carries less weight when there is a greater turnout, and more weight when fewer people come to the polls. We’re talking percentages after all, so if only one person shows up, then, yes, his single vote decides the election.
Yet last week’s parks vote proves that is not entirely true because when the public is evenly split on an issue that needs a simple majority to pass, then circumstances like a broken-down car, an unexpected crisis at the office or a high-fever trip to the emergency room could deny one side that crucial vote that costs them the election. One vote for equals one vote against.
In this case, the measure needed more than 60 percent to pass — a supermajority — which means, of course, fewer opponents to stop it. Now it does appear that the minority holds the power, because one “no” vote knocks out two “yes” votes.
So for this parks improvement referendum, perhaps the supporters should have adopted the slogan that “Every two votes matter.”
The twist in Iowa is that we allow people to register to vote on election day, and this single voter came in with a driver’s license that showed an old address. The state allows this for drivers moving to a new home inside Iowa, but that won’t fly with election officials where voters register by county. Yet the election officials did take down what information they could from that driver’s license.
So the election judges gave him a ballot but did not allow him to run it through the ballot-counting computer. They set it aside and told him to return with proof that he did, indeed, live inside the city.
The election was Tuesday, and he had until noon Thursday to bring in that proof.
He didn’t.
However, when the City of West Branch heard about this deadline, City Administrator Matt Muckler cranked out a list of every water and sewer customer inside the city limits, as well as copies of all their bills. Muckler did not know who voted, or how, but, by George, he could blanket the Cedar County Auditor’s office with address verifications.
He had nothing to lose and it worked. In a special meeting, the Precinct Board concluded that between the driver’s license and utility bills, they could determine this voter was who he said he was, that he lived inside the city, and that his vote should count.
After Tuesday’s election, 241 “yes” votes out of 402 total votes gave the $4 million measure 59.95 percent support. After the Precinct Board met, that support increased to 242 of 403, or 60.0496 percent.
Yeah, that margin is small.
But the difference is big.
A $4 million difference.
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