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Friday, November 28, 2008

City Prop. 1 Vote Breakdown

Posted by Erica C. Barnett on Fri, Nov 28, 2008 at 12:45 PM

A few days old, but Seattle Transit Blog has a nice breakdown of how Proposition 1 (mass transit expansion) did in various parts of King County. Not surprisingly, the highest "yes" votes were in the uber-liberal (and pro-transit) 43rd and 36th Legislative Districts (the latter supporting more transit even though it won't be served directly by light-rail expansion); however, every legislative district in Seattle supported the measure, and only the 34th and 11th Districts (which include parts of King County, such as Renton and Vashon Island, that aren't in Seattle) approved mass transit by less than 60 percent. The map, of course, is somewhat misleading; in many eastern King County districts in particular, only part of the district was eligible to vote on Proposition 1.

Comments (6) RSS

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Well, the 36th (71.00%), 46th (68.76%) and 37th (68.41) were all within 3% of each other while the 43rd (80.93%) was almost 10% higher than the 36th. The map reminds me of my stat class discussion on How to Lie with Statistics. The 43rd was very different than the rest of the districts. They could be in their own 80% and higher category.

That said, it is great news that folks in the areas that will benefit from the expansion supported Prop 1 with such margins.

Posted by Stats tell a lot on November 28, 2008 at 1:53 PM

I was one of those that nixed this transit thing. Ya know why? Cuz I'm just plain over any organization that wants on the gravy train that thinks it's OK to further bloat our sales tax which is one of the highest in the nation. I sometimes get the idea that those who are glomming on to the sales tax want us to emulate the UK with their 17% VAT (which is a sales tax that you just don't add at the end of your transaction it's already figgered in to the cost of your junk.)

Posted by Joseph on November 28, 2008 at 3:39 PM

Goddamn, Erica, do your homework. Vashon Island is not part of the Sound Transit district.

Posted by duh on November 28, 2008 at 4:19 PM

@2 How would you suggest we pay for it. It's either sales tax, property tax, or a state income tax. Something has to happen. Maybe we should have an initiative that makes it illegal for a "household" to have more than one car.

Posted by elswinger on November 28, 2008 at 6:57 PM

Those LD-by-LD results include only the poll voters and a very small fraction of the absentee voters. Final results won't be released until sometime around December 2.

Posted by Brendan on November 28, 2008 at 9:35 PM

@2 - whatever. People who voted against both are either transit haters or people who want tax subsidies for their cars.

Most people who swung from 60 percent against the prior vote to join the 60 percent for the current vote did so because of: global warming, transit, total price, and concern for the environment in general.

Thanks for hating America, Joseph.

Posted by Will in Seattle on November 29, 2008 at 7:45 PM