It’s official. The Nov 4th election set a new record in Indianapolis/Marion County, with 381,759 voting. That’s 54.7 percent of registered voters. But excluding the 116,000 “inactive voters,” those who haven’t voted for many years, actual voter turnout was more like 65.6 percent.
And in this record setting city/county election, African-Americans also turned out in record numbers. A turnout that fueled President-elect Barack Obama’s 107,674 vote landslide and big wins for virtually every Democratic candidate on the ballot.
Just Tellin’ It analyzed the votes from the city/county’s Black-majority precincts and found that heavy turnout drove Democrats big victories Nov. 4.
Some 41.7 percent of Obama’s 241,987 countywide votes came from Indianapolis’ 190 precincts (out of the total 590) where more than 51 percent of the population is African-American.
Obama got 85.5 percent of the vote in Black-majority precincts, a landslide of 84,441 votes. Despite the strong results in Black precincts, 58.3 percent of Obama’s total votes came from Indy’s white-majority precincts, which our new president won by 54 percent or 23,233 votes.
Obama’s votes from Black precincts were balanced throughout the six townships with Center Township’s Black precincts providing 21.7 percent of Obama’s votes, followed by Pike (19.3 percent), Washington (18.4 percent) and Lawrence (16.3 percent).
Center Township’s Black precincts also provided Obama’s highest vote margin (95.8 percent), followed by Lawrence (85.8 percent), Washington (85.3 percent), Wayne (82.4 percent) and Pike (82.1 percent).
Congressman Andre Carson’s landslide victory was fueled by African-American voters as well as 55.9 percent of Carson’s votes came from Black-majority precincts in the 7th Congressional District.
Marion County Treasurer Mike Rodman garnered the most votes by any African-American city or county office candidate ever. And huge margins from Black precincts fueled Rodman’s smashing win as 42.8 percent of Rodman’s total vote came from Black precincts. As did 78,551 of Rodman’s 91,000 winning margin. Rodman garnered 84.8 percent of the votes from Black-majority precincts.
The only Republican to capture sizeable voters from Black-majority precincts was Gov. Mitch Daniels. Our analysis showed that Daniels got 31.6 percent of the votes from Black-majority precincts in the city/county. Daniels captured 17.6 percent of Center Township’s Black precinct votes; 28.8 percent of votes in Lawrence’s Black precincts; 31.9 percent in Wayne, 35.6 percent in Washington, 36.3 percent in Warren.
Daniels did best in Black-majority precincts in Pike Townships where he captured a stunning 40.2 percent of the vote.
Daniels’ strength of Black-majority precincts was not just because of his campaign’s efforts to reach out to Black voters, but also Jill Long Thompson’s abysmal campaign efforts directed to Blacks.
Analyzing Marion County’s Black vote is extremely difficult given the diaspora of Black population throughout the city/county the last 10 years and the level of racial integration in many neighborhoods.
It’s obvious given the strong vote totals in Black precincts, that Black turnout in Indianapolis far exceeded 60 percent and probably record setting as well.
What I’m hearing in the streets
The Washington Township Board voted last week to raise their annual stipend from $2,250 to $3,600. That’s a 60 percent increase, but in hard dollars up $1,350 for each of the seven board members. Raising the township’s budget by a whopping $9,450.
But Channel 6 reporter Norman Cox had viewers believing that the board was ripping off taxpayers. The cost to an average Washington Township taxpayer would be literally a small fraction of a penny. A non-story. But, unfortunately, it was given legs and credibility because of an irrational response by some of the board’s Democratic members who lashed out at Cox and a station cameraman.
This column has condemned local Democratic politicians’ negative attitudes towards local media. While I agree some local mainstream media have been hostile to local Democrats, being uncooperative to media never works.
This story could’ve been defused with a simple “Norm, the cost to taxpayers is just nine and half grand. A thousandth of a penny per taxpayer at best. This is a non story and that’s all I have to say.”
After their massive November victory, local Democrats have a unique opportunity to rebuild their images among voters. Attacking and not cooperating with media, made a bad story even worse for the Washington Township Board. Democrats must stop shooting themselves in the foot with local media.
Throughout his first term, Gov. Mitch Daniels didn’t hide his distaste for the K-12 education establishment in Indiana. Daniels felt strongly that reform, perhaps radical, was long overdue in Indiana’s public schools.
That’s why, when Superintendent of Public Instruction Dr. Suellen Reed said she wouldn’t run for re-election, Daniels quickly moved to find and push his candidate — Dr. Tony Bennett, a school superintendent from Southern Indiana.
Now Superintendent-elect Bennett is embarking on a course that could bring perhaps radical change to Indiana’s public schools, if his transition team is any indication.
They include a bunch of strong Daniels’ supporters, including Dr. Carol D’Amico who Daniels wanted to run Ivy Tech, two former top Steve Goldsmith aides Joe Loftus and Anne Shane, and the state Chamber of Commerce’s education point person Derek Redelman.
I’m not sure yet if Bennett’s platform of reform will benefit or hurt African-American students’ education. His campaign proposal to give teachers immunity from lawsuits involving student discipline disturbs me.
And public school funding will be declining because state tax revenues will be declining because of the recession. With less money for schools, our community needs to carefully watch Superintendent-elect Bennett to hope he’ll be a school’s chief interested in children first, not a radical agenda more about politics than learning.
News director is the individual deciding what you see on local TV newscasts. Currently, WRTV (Channel 6) and WXIN (Channel 59) are looking for news directors.
Indianapolis’ TV news directors have been overwhelmingly white men, with a couple of white females, including current WTHR (Channel 13) News Director Carolyn Williams.
But there’s never been an African-American TV news director here. In the 1980s Loretta Mouzon was the first and only Black executive news producer in the city, the second ranking TV newsroom position. But a Black has never held the top spot.
Instead of going after the same old same old, the general managers and news consultants at Channel 6 and/or 59 should dare to be different. There’s plenty of qualified African-American TV news directors and executive producers in the country. One of them should be Channel 59 or 6’s next news director.
See ‘ya next week.
Amos Brown’s opinions are not necessarily those of the Indianapolis Recorder Newspaper. You can contact him at (317) 221-0915 or by e-mail at ACBROWN@AOL.COM.
