I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
Research and Polling, the New Mexico firm headed up by analyst Brian Sanderoff, recently posted an analysis of Albuquerque’s 2009 municipal election on its Web site. The analysis, a series of charts, shows that overall turnout was 25 percent of registered voters. Votes for Mayor Richard Berry were strong in northern city council districts. Richard Romero was strong in the south. But incumbent Martin Chavez, who lost the election to Berry, had support spread more evenly through the city.
Voters came out in greater numbers in City Council Districts 5, 7 and 8; the highest numbers of registered voters in the city are in District 5, followed by Districts 4, 7, and 8. Those districts are located in the north—both the east and west areas of Albuquerque—something the color-coded charts provided by Research & Polling show in stark relief. Dividing total numbers of voters by registered voters gave Districts 7 and 8 the highest percentage of turnout.
As was noted in The Independent earlier, while Republicans make up 32 percent of registered voters in the city, they comprised 41.4 percent of those who turned out to vote. Berry won with 44 percent of the vote.
One interesting analysis posted by Research and Polling is a comparison through color coded charts of Brad Winter’s voter turnout in 2005 and Berry’s in 2009. The demographics of the candidates in the 2005 race largely mirrored those of 2009. Winter, who is a city councilor, was the lone Anglo Republican in the race in 2005, running against a more liberal Hispanic, Eric Griego, and incumbent Mayor Martin Chavez.
Another interesting tidbit: More Republicans voted by mail. GOP voters comprised 51.5 percent of the mail-in vote, compared to 41.4 percent overall. In 2005, they made up 38.8 percent of the mail-in vote, which was the same share they had of the vote that year.
