There was quite the buzz around town about the Aug. 20 primary election. A lot of you talked about our local candidates and how it’s the start of another very “interesting” election season.
And then, when it came time to cast votes, only 17.25%—just over 1 out of 6 of the 55% of you who live in Osceola County who are registered—made your decision heard.
Some of you have excuses, not reasons, for not voting. “It’s just a primary … I come from Puerto Rico where we just vote once every four years … I forgot to apply for a mail-in ballot and I didn’t have time … I’m an independent and none of those partisan races are on my ballot.”
Those are the common ones. To me, there are no “unimportant” or “less important” elections. Our votes count the same in any race—one for the candidates we select. I’ve never missed casting a ballot in my life when given the opportunity, going back to 1992. I go even when there’s just one item on the ballot, and it takes me longer to pull in the parking spot and walk into the precinct than it does to fill in the bubble.
I go every time because I would never want our government to think I didn’t consider my vote important.
Local races—Kissimmee and St. Cloud city commissions and School Board—were on everybody’s primary ballots, along with the judges’ races. That’s even if you are registered as a third-party or No Party Affiliation (NPA) voter. And those races have more impact on your daily life than however you swing in Trump/Harris or even a U.S. Senate race.
Impact—if you live in Kissimmee, it doesn’t get more impactful than the mayor. In a race where the leader only got 30% of the vote, the Nov. 5 runoff will be really important. It became really, really important when second place was settled by just six votes. And then the two candidates who fought for second and third were even more pained when they found out about 280 city voters didn’t turn over their ballot and vote that or other city races, even though their ballot noted at the bottom, “Vote both sides of ballot.” (Come to think about it, I didn’t check the back of my Orange County ballot, or note if it said anything about that side. My wife said she checked the back of hers, but we have different party ballots.)
“I should be happy, but I’m actually disappointed,” said John Cortes, who under the circumstances will face Jackie Espinosa in the Nov. 5 winner-take-all mayoral election.
Regarding a few grassroots candidates, some on the ballot for the first time, you won’t see their names again if you were among the 83% who didn’t vote. And, since two School Board races were settled in the primaries because they garnered more than 50% of the vote in multi-way races, those vote-less souls won’t get to complain about the jobs Bethzaida Garcia and Anthony Cook do on the board after they get sworn in in November.
Osceola’s election officials expect voter turnout over 70% in the Nov. 5 general election. Why can’t we get that closer to 100%?
Let your vote count—let it be important.
