THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, November 12, 1995 TAG: 9511090165
SECTION: CAROLINA COAST PAGE: 06 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
SOURCE: PERRY PARKS
LENGTH: Long : 106 lines
Note: Ronald L. Speer is on vacation this week. Coast editor Perry Parks is trying to fill his big shoes.
Is anyone paying attention?
There's a lot of talk in the media and in coffee shops around the country about how mad everybody is - how bitterly they've come to distrust government and dislike public officials.
When you look at the way things get done - or in many cases, don't get done - you can appreciate some of this discontent. But people's attitudes of late, more than anything else, are the result of their own apathy.
The Associated Press reports that staggeringly low numbers of registered voters turned out for municipal elections across North Carolina on Tuesday - including around 20 percent in the capital city of Raleigh. That means a mere fraction of the people who bothered to sign up to vote have any say in who runs their cities.
In many instances, our region actually bucked the trend, with more than 40 percent voting in Edenton and an apparent record 53 percent turning out in Manteo on Tuesday. But I wouldn't shout from the rooftops in the world community that Americans consider one in two eligible people voting a ``good'' turnout.
A few days before Elizabeth City's elections last month, we reported that Mayor Rick Gardner had received 1,235 votes when he was elected in 1993. He won 54 percent of the votes cast in a four-way race, but only about 7 percent of the 17,000-plus people Gardner represents actually put him into office.
The only person who called to express concern about that statistic was an irate woman who insisted that Elizabeth City's population is nowhere near 17,000 people and that we were confused with Pasquotank County. She was wrong, but she hung up before we could straighten her out.
Gardner received even fewer votes in his re-election bid Oct. 10, but that can be forgiven.
He was unopposed.
On a city council whose effectiveness is criticized occasionally even by its own members (Gardner pleaded with the council Monday to, ``for one time,'' take action on an issue that's been stalled for more than a year), only two of four seats saw contested races.
Not a single incumbent in Elizabeth City was challenged, and fewer than one in seven registered voters bothered to cast a ballot.
And while some Albemarle communities had better-than-average showings last week, that pattern of unconcern checked several others. There were no contested races in Gatesville; none in the Hertford County towns of Cofield, Como, Harrellsville or Winton; none in Kitty Hawk.
Whom do we blame for bad government?
The problems of mismanagement, misappropriation or mis-anything else that we grouse about may originate with government. But the sole problem with government is US.
We are government. We make government. We choose those who run government. We can point fingers, but we're standing in a roomful of mirrors.
One can argue that it rained all day Tuesday, dampening spirits and stopping many would-be voters from going to the polls.
Nonsense. Voting is an indoor sport. Like bowling and billiards, only with more lasting impact. Rain's no excuse.
One can argue that municipalities are the least important tier of government, but turnout in state and federal elections also generally hovers around a 50 percent mark.
Besides, as the U.S. Congress continues to push money and problems and everything else it's supposed to deal with down to the states, local governments will find themselves making more and more important decisions for their residents.
Should 10 or 15 or 20 percent of your neighbors determine your tax rates, your level of police protection, your school policies? That's what's happening.
The problems of citizens and government go beyond nonparticipation. Ignorance plays a role among a huge swath of those who at least get credit for being involved.
That's one reason why Pasquotank County last month backed out of a volatile merger study it had spent two years co-sponsoring with Elizabeth City. Many people in the county opposed the prospect of merging with Elizabeth City, but a precious few understood the study process. Many seemed not to know that, ultimately, they would decide in a referendum whether or not to merge.
Even the county commissioners who changed their minds on the study pleaded ignorance of the process - saying they didn't understand what they were getting into when they approved it back in March. Is anyone paying attention?
This lack of knowledge about what government does is why money has become so important to political campaigns. If the people with the gumption to vote also took the time to understand, they could make reasoned decisions based on debates and news coverage and some careful thought.
But not many people show up for candidates' forums, and not many people read the paper very closely. That's why those screaming, vitriol-filled television commercials that aim only to ruin people's reputations so often can decide elections.
And that's why candidates are slaves to special interests that are willing to fork over the cost of some of those over-the-top commercials.
And that's why it gets harder and harder to figure out what's at stake in any given election.
And that's one reason, I suppose, why so few people vote.
This isn't a great time to rally the electorate, since the next chance to cast a ballot won't come until spring primaries.
But it's not too early to bone up on local, state and national issues. And you can call your council members or county commissioners any day of the week. Most of them even meet regularly to make decisions about your life.
Rembember, though, that their decisions originate with your decisions. And when you complain about them - especially if you haven't voted - you're complaining about yourself. by CNB