Election 2009 Maps: Chapel Hill

The maps in this post show the precinct-level results of the Chapel Hill mayoral and council elections. The maps are based on unofficial numbers updated on November 6 by the Orange County Board of Elections.

An important note: Approximately 18% of the voters in the Chapel Hill election voted early and could not be represented in the maps below. Thus, these maps are inaccurate to the extent that early voters made different choices than people who voted on Election Day. The overall results among early voters are remarkably similar to the Election Day results in both the mayoral and council races. However, I cannot draw any conclusions about what precinct-level differences may exist.

The first map below shows the 22 precincts in the Chapel Hill municipal boundary, including parts of Durham County.

Chapel Hill Precincts

MAYOR

Because this was a close race between Mark Kleinschmidt and Matt Czajkowski, I condensed the central part of the scale so the maps would highlight the differences between the candidates' results. Kleinschmidt's strongest precincts were Northside (75%), Lincoln (70%), Weaver Dairy Satellite (67%), and Mason Farm (63%). Other precincts in which he exceeded 55% of the vote included Coker Hills, Colonial Heights, Country Club, Kings Mill, Weaver Dairy, and Westwood. Czajkowski's strongest precincts were Battle Park, Cedar Falls, Durham, Glenwood, and Patterson. (I did not include maps for Augustus Cho and Kevin Wolff. They received less than 4% of the vote combined.)

[Update 11/10/2009: As noted above, the results maps do not include early or absentee votes. Therefore, I have added a third map below showing the percentage of votes in each precinct that were early or absentee votes. The new map seems to confirm (1) Gerry's observation that precincts that leaned heavily toward Kleinschmidt in Election Day voting also had high levels of early voting and (2) Jason's observation that a high level of early voting in the Battle Park precinct may have offset some of the heavy Election Day turnout for Czajkowski in that precinct.]

Chapel Hill Mayor: CzajkowskiChapel Hill Mayor: KleinschmidtChapel Hill Mayor: Key Chapel Hill Mayor: Early/Absentee VotesChapel Hill Mayor: Early/Absentee Votes Key

COUNCIL 

The maps suggest that fourth-place finisher Gene Pease tended to receive votes from the same precincts as Czajkowski (and non-seat winner Matt Pohlman), and that first-place finisher Penny Rich and second-place finisher Ed Harrison tended to have support in the same areas as Kleinschmidt (and non-seat winner Jim Merritt) — with some interesting counterexamples and a good deal of overlap, of course. I'm hoping Xan Gregg will explore some of the correlations among the candidates, like he did for the last election (hint, hint).

Chapel Hill Council: DehartChapel Hill Council: EasthomChapel Hill Council: HarrisonChapel Hill Council: Key
Chapel Hill Council: MerrittChapel Hill Council: PeaseChapel Hill Council: Pohlman
Chapel Hill Council: RaymondChapel Hill Council: Rich 

Issues: 

Comments

Not at Carol Woods...

Easy to figure this out this election on map---don't overcomplicate it.

 Those who pay the tax burden or are getting a homeless shelter exported to their neighborhood voted for Matt C. and Matt P., Gene P. and John D.

As Chapel Hill gets more built out, the Student vote that the far left rely on will be overcome by the vote count of actual residents that bear the burden of running a college town with their pocketbooks and families.

BTW, I am pro gay rights, pro homeless shelter/IFC, pro environmental and voted for all the candidates above.

I'm not at all convinced that a fiscal conservative is necessarily the most qualified person to manage the Town effectively, and therefore to minimize our tax burden. I think there are a variety of skills and talents needed including a visionary approach to economic development (not tired old big boxes, for example), smart land-use planning (sprawl is expensive), a strong sense of service and commitment to the community, and knowing how local government can work to really get things done.I see all of these things in Mark Kleinschmidt, and I hope that in the next 2 years other people will see and appreciate these qualities as well.

The idea that someone with a business background is the panacea for town budget woes is a little exagerated. Depends on the business and their individual skill set.Right now, most towns could use someone who really knows their way around public finance and how to successfully apply for federal and state grants and navigate their systems. And a pensions, benefits and insurance expert couldn't hoit. 

As Chapel Hill gets more built out, the Student vote that the far left rely on will be overcome by the vote count of actual residents that bear the burden of running a college town with their pocketbooks and families

easy solution, let's have the students leave!! The State will be glad to keep all the UNC employees anyway, right?  By the way, the early vote file shows ages, there were less than 400 early votes by persons 22 and under.

But seriously, the Town isn't the same without the students. I moved here, because it had a University. Without the students and the small businesses and cool restaraunts and bars they support, we would be Cary.As for whether they tipped the election this year or not, it is quite likely they did. But if they did, thank God they are active and engaged in the voting process. I wish everyone was.

Gerry, thanks for quoting the anonyomous post above.  For years, I've heard from seniors (elderly, not UNC seniors) that UNC students don't count, that UNC students don't pay taxes, that UNC alone should fund the bus system, etc, etc, etc.  Get real guys.  Oversimplified, UNC students are one of the two primary reasons (the other being health care/medical research) that UNC exists and Chapel Hill is what it is.  The paradox here is that the very environment that UNC, UNCH and the K-12 schools foster is what attracted the complainers here.UNC students are citizens of the town.  They pay taxes, they use services. Also, the premise of the post is false, for what the UNC students don't do, unfortunately, is to vote in local elections.  They register in large numbers, but even with the convenience of on-campus voting at the planeterium, their turnout is poor.There have been some really nasty letters in the local papers since the election -- letters just dripping with anger.  I've never seen this in CH politics before.  What's going on?  

There have been some really nasty letters in the local papers since the election -- letters just dripping with anger.  I've never seen this in CH politics before.  What's going on?

It's pretty obvious reading the letters. Mark Kleinschmidt did NOT win because he got the most votes, but because there were four candidates. He does not have a mandate because there were four candidates. In fact perhaps he was not actually elected at all!! He's not really the Mayor. Where is his birth certificate?

Irony aside (there should be an irony emoticon....), everyone seems to assume that Mark K. would not have gotten any of the votes cast for Cho or Wolff.  It's not a bad assumption, given that those two candidates were perceived to be more conservative, but it's still only an assumption.  It may be true that if everyone who voted for Wolff and Cho had voted for Czajkowski, he would have won - but they didn't vote for him.  And it raises the question of why those who voted for them, voted for them instead of Matt C.  Ostensibly, the intent was to withhold their vote from any sitting Council member to express disapproval; but the net effect was to take their vote out of play -- visible but with essentially the same effect as non-voters' absent votes.  Which left Czajkowski vs. Kleinschmidt.  And Kleinschmidt did win.(This is something of a replay of a 'discussion' with a sibling who voted for Nader in 2000.)

Cho & Wolff supporters did not vote for Matt and Mark won. It was a closely contested election. When emotions run high, it's easy to get sidetracked with things like anonymous postcards and turn them into something more than we otherwise would. The gracious thing to do would be for all of Mark's supporters to please turn your heads aside for just a very few moments as Matt's supporters blow off some steam, flail about, and yell obscenities in the privacy of our own homes or, failing that, shout them to the world in letters to the editor. Eventually, everyone will pick themselves up, dust themselves off and get back to work.  :)

I heard there was also a socialist/marxist running as a write in candidate for mayor of Chapel Hill in this election.  And that candidate was a UNC student who maybe also works on campus. It wasn't a very serious campaign by any means, but I heard they had a kegger as campaign event so at least they were having events, and that he was trying to at least get several of his friends vote for him as a write in.http://www.new.facebook.com/home.php#/group.php?gid=146537542686He's got nearly 200 group members as supporters.Here is his twitter feed:http://twitter.com/ben4mayorHere is his campaign website:http://bencarrollformayor.wordpress.com/ Why, oh why, did they have to siphon off votes from the left? =p

I agree with the premise that no one can know why people voted for Cho or Wolff.  And I understand fully the parallel between "A vote for Nader is a vote for Bush", and "a vote for Wolff or Cho is a vote for Kleinschmidt"  Now I didn't support Bush one whit, so why did I, someone whose first car was a 1968 Corvair (It was a fun car, by the way, though I had to carry a spare fan belt and clutch cable), vote for Nader?  Because I liked Nader more than Gore and I knew that Bush was going to win big in NC. He did, by 13 pct points in both 2000 and 2004.  Similarly there are people who liked Wolff or Cho more than Czajkowski, and voted for either of them because they thought that Kleinschmidt would win big.  For Matt to say that without them (Cho and Wolff), I would have won, is just shoulda, coulda, woulda.  Cho and Wolff were in the race and Matt had to design his campaign with them in mind.Finally, I think that Matt ran a good campaign, used his advantages wisely, minimized his weaknesses, with the result that Mark dodged a bullet. 

J. Capowski wrote: ...I knew that Bush was going to win big in NCMy brother voted in Florida at the time (don't know what he drove); by mutual agreement we don't talk much about it now.

Since I was called out here by Damon, I've posted a cluster analysis of precincts and candidates on my blog: http://www.forthgo.com/blog/2009/11/16/chapel-hill-election-clustering/ 

And it is weird that some precincts didn't support anybody very much.

The mysterious middle blue cluster is a result of the fact that Kings Mill, Patterson, and One Stop include voters who do not live in the Chapel Hill town limit and thus don't vote in the mayor and council races.

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