And this is how CANDIDATES ARE TARGETING THEM AND YOU
by Keith Laing, The Brunswick News
Citizens hoping to grab the attention of the politicians who represent them have many tools at their disposal.
They can write letters to their representatives, call their offices, attend public meetings or join sympathetic or rival civic organizations. However, the single most effective way that the Average Joe can end up on their favorite – or least favorite – politician’s radar is by voting for or against them.
Simply put, political careers live and die by election results. Then, and only then, campaign chatter subsides and voters are heard loud and clear, said Carl Wege, an associate political science professor at Coastal Georgia Community College.
“There are many things (politicians) are not concerned with, but they respond to voters,” he said. “Voting is the most effective way to communicate (with them).”
Which begs the question: As we approach the partisan primary elections July 18, who is doing the voting, and thus deciding who makes decisions in Glynn County?
According to statistics from the Glynn County Board of Elections, 72 percent of the more than 38,000 registered voters in the county reside on the mainland and 28 percent live on one of the Golden Isles. Moreover, registered mainland voter turnout in the 2004 countywide elections was nearly 20 percent higher than the number of registered island voters casting ballots on Election Day.
Additionally, the Glynn County electorate is majority Caucasian and female. Through April, there were nearly 4,000 more women registered to vote than men in the coming election and roughly four times as many white voters signed up than any other race listed on the voter registration form – white, black, Asian and Hispanic.
However, the race and gender combination that experienced the biggest increase in registered voters between 2004 and 2006 was black females, which went up four percent in that span.
But how important are those numbers? Very, says Wege. In fact, they play a big role in determining which policies are advanced by politicians after they are elected, he added.
“Demographics that do not vote in significant numbers tend to be the first to lose in confrontations with politicians,” Wege said. “In governing, politicians have to make choices, and they usually make choices that affect demographics that are voting positively.”
Wege added that its natural for elected officials to be concerned with having to earn enough voter confidence to win more time in office.
“If I’m a politician, one consideration (in decision-making) is how this is going to affect my re-election chances,” he said. “If I’ve got to cut a program, I’m going to cut a program that doesn’t negatively affect people who are voting.”
Former campaign manager Anita Collins said that voter demographics are just as vital to those hoping to replace elected officials. Collins, who ran 2005 Brunswick mayoral candidate Elaine Brown’s bid for office before it was derailed by a legal challenge late in the campaign, said her campaign’s first step upon entering the race was checking the numbers.
“Any time you run a campaign, you have to look at the voter rolls,” she said. “It’s very important. What are the demographics? What are their jobs? What’s the median income?”
That type of information, Collins said, helped her campaign identify voters with whom its message would best resonate.
“We paid very close attention to who the voters were,” Collins continued. “We knew who the voters were and where they lived, so we could knock on doors and let people know who we were and why we were in the campaign.”
With that in mind, Robert Griffin, who managed Brunswick Mayor Bryan Thompson’s successful run against Brown and two other candidates last fall, said future local campaigns would be wise to also pay attention to who is going to the polls and why.
“This county and city still votes on racial and party lines,” he said. “I’ve been active in politics for 42 years and I have yet to see a minority candidate run and win in Districts 1, 2 and 3.
“District 5 is really the only district that minorities can be guaranteed a seat and that seat was set up by the (U.S. Department of Justice) years ago,” he said.
However, state House Majority Leader Jerry Keen, R-St. Simons Island, cautioned that depending solely on demographics to shape a candidate’s message can be perilous. Keen, who faces no opposition in the primary but will square off with Democrat LeRoy Dumas in November, said that successful candidates sometimes have to go with their instincts, even if they are contrary to what the numbers say will be effective.
“I think you have to be who you are and say what you believe regardless of who you’re talking to,” he said. “You have to go out there and say ‘these are the things I believe in and these are things I stand for.’”
Keen added that doing so helps candidates reap the political nirvana of long-term electoral rewards.
“Voters respond to honesty and integrity a lot more than some message contrived by a consultant,” he said. “When you start altering your message, you’re not going to succeed, long-term.”
Glynn County Commission Chairman Don Hogan, who will be challenged by former county commissioner David Dowdy in the primary, also said that voter demographics can be overvalued.
“When I run for office, I run countywide,” he said. “I don’t try to see who lives here and who lives there. I just get out there and work the whole county.”
Hogan, an at-large commissioner, added that covering all the bases was especially important in countywide contests.
“I represent the whole county, so I try to reach everybody I can,” he said. “I think every voter is important.”
