The 2021 municipal election is less than a week away, which means those involved with the Proposition C.O.P.S. initiative will soon know whether or not a new jail will be in the county’s near future. In addition, direction will be given on the Perry County Health Department and Memorial Hospital boards as well as Altenburg Public School District No. 48 Board of Education.
In his office on the last Friday of March, Perry County Clerk Jared Kutz predicted a voter turnout of between 17 and 21 percent.
“It’s simple,” Kutz said. “One, it’s not being blasted all over the news and airwaves, not as many people are aware it’s even going on. I can’t establish a reason why voters don’t think it’s as important as other elections. I think it’s completely critical.”
“I use this example every judge training I do for municipal elections,” Kutz said. “Municipal government...our schools boards, our local health department and hospital boards, our municipal elections, these are the elections for the people and the issues that face us right here at home. Every time I call the White House I never get a phone call back but I can text the mayor right now and say I need to meet him and he’ll make something happen. I’ll see him this afternoon. That’s the difference. These are our neighbors that are controlling our local government and to me that’s as important as anything because we feel that more. Municipal governments are the ones that keep the water on. They’re the ones that make sure our sewers work. Our local leaders are the ones affecting our health department that’s going to give us care if we need it. Our hospital is our local hospital, so it’s our local government vs. our state or federal government.”
Money talks at the mid-term and presidential elections in November, according to Kutz. Not so much at the municipal level, though.
“At the state and federal level, they’re dumping 10s of thousands, 100s of thousands and even millions, and in presidential elections, billions of dollars into informing the voters,” he said. “The money’s not there to make that happen at a local level.”
The COVID-19 pandemic delayed last year’s municipal election from April until early June. Kutz suggested
this could have led voters to not participate, or not even find out who was running.
“I think in a year we just went through in 2020 with the pandemic and everything, we maybe as a community, not as many people were paying attention,” Kutz said.
“When things are going good and it doesn’t necessarily affect your life per se, it doesn’t register on your radar...things associated with the hospital and the health department and how they handled the authority that could be granted to those agencies through emergency declarations, it put it on the front burner and people were paying attention more.”
For those wondering if their polling place has changed, that won’t be the case.That will all remain the same, with the Perryville 1 and Perryville 4 precincts combined at the Perry Park Center. In addition, the Uniontown/Longtown (Grace Lutheran School, 84 Grace Lane), Lithium/Brewer (Elizabeth Seton Hall, 59 Shady Lane) and Crosstown/Farrar (Bethlehem Baptist Church, 160 PCR 350) precincts will be combined again.
Kutz predicted a countywide turnout of about 19 percent this April, though this tally will likely be higher in the Altenburg and Frohna precincts due to contested Board of Education races for Altenburg Public School District No. 48.
“I would be ecstatic with 2,500 voters,” Kutz said.
Plugging that total into the number of registered voters in the June 2020 municipal election, 12,008, would give Perry County a turnout of 20.81 percent.
Kutz thinks the individuals seeking office should help with participation.
“This is first time we’ve had a big swath of candidates for both boards and then of course anytime there’s a tax issue on the ballot, particularly in a conservative community like Perryville that we’re fortunate to live in, you’re going to see an interest, an uptick with a tax issue such as Prop C.O.P.S. on the ballot.”
PRoposition C.O.P.S.
The Perry County Board of Commissioners took action in late December to place Proposition (Court Operations Police Sheriff) C.O.P.S. on the April ballot. The 65-word question asked voters whether or not they favor a half cent sales tax for 20 years and one-eighth of a cent after that for the purpose of providing funding for constructing and maintaining a county justice center.
Those involved with the Proposition C.O.P.S. initiative will soon know if the efforts have paid off.
Kutz conceded it comes down to being honest with the voters.
In April 2016, county voters approved a local parks tax question (78 percent, 1,666 votes in favor. A year later, in 2017, voters strongly favored a sales tax to fund roads and bridges (83.65 percent, 3,372 votes in favor).
In 2019, when voter turnout was 9.24 percent (1,149 ballots cast among 12,434 registered), just five of the county’s 18 precincts surpassed 10 percent turnout, led by Farrar (36 of 200, 18 percent) and followed by Longtown (42 of 302, 13.91 percent) and Perryville 1 (185 of 1,611, 11.48 percent).
