More Indications Relative Turnout was the key to Kovach's Win 1-13-2011

Tom Kovach won in only 12 of 26 Representative Districts in the Jan 13,2001 Special Election for New Castle County Council President, but six districts provided him with a huge enough winning margin that he was able to win countywide by more than 15 percentage points. These six districts are the 4th, 6th, 7th, 10th,11th and 12th. Because different parts of a rep district can be in different county council districts the election districts within these representative districts overlap multiple county council districts, but these districts somewhat mirror (thought do not exactly reflect )the combined borders of the 2nd, 3rd & 8th county council districts which make an arc across the northern portion of New Castle County--Kovach's Arc of Triumph, in this election.

Here is a link to a map of the 12 county council districts where you can see the arc the 2nd, 3rd & 8th council district make:

http://www.nccde.org/Council/2005Districts.htm


Here are the results & turnout in Kovach's six most productive rep districts.
The following rep districts have Democratic State reps and Democratic registration edges between 500 to 3000 more registered Ds than Rs:

4th—registered voters—16,571
Kovach won 1373 to 735 for Sheldon---638 winning margin
Total turnout 2126—12.8% turnout


6th----registered voters—17,037
Kovach won 1592 to 530 for Sheldon---1062 winning margin
Total turnout 2129----12.5% turnout

7th-registered voters- 15,225
Kovach won 1536 to 693 for Sheldon---843 winning margin
Total turnout 2247------14.8% turnout


10th-registered voters- 16,697
Kovach won 1167 to 421 for Sheldon---746 winning margin
Total turnout 1591------9.5% turnout

These two districts each have a Republican State Representative and each has between 300 & 900 more Democratic than Republican registered voters:

11th-registered voters- 16,011
Kovach won 969 to 368 for Sheldon---601 winning margin
Total turnout 1347------8.4% turnout


12th-registered voters- 15,589
Kovach won 1543 to 628 for Sheldon---915 winning margin
Total turnout 2181------14.0% turnout

This is the winning margin produced by these 6 districts:
4th Rep District (Wilmington & western suburbs)margin-----638
6th Rep District (Edgemoor)-------------------margin-----1062
7th Rep District (Brandywine Hundred)--------margin-----843
10th Rep District(Brandywine Hundred)--------margin----746
11th Rep District (Brandywine Hundred)-------margin----601
12th Rep District (Mt Cuba/Yorllyn)-----------margin----915
Winning margin these six--------------------------------4805

Countywide- Kovach-16,721— Sheldon-12,139 -winning margin 4582

Coming into these 6 districts Kovach is down by 223,but he walks away with the election because these districts averaged 12% turnout as a group (5% better than the county as a whole) and because they voted so lopsidedly for Kovach.

Sheldon won more Rep Districts. He won 14 and Kovach won 12 Rep Districts,but the turnout was significantly lower in the districts where Sheldon won and his winning margins were nowhere near these 6 overperforming districts Kovach had.

Here is what it looked like in the six most productive districts for Sheldon.

The following rep districts each have a Democratic State rep and Democratic registration edges between 5000 to 8000 more registered Ds than Rs:

1st Rep District—registered voters— 13,983
Sheldon won 585 to 197 for Kovach--- 388winning margin
Total turnout 785—5.6% turnout


2nd Rep District----registered voters—13,338
Sheldon won 448 to 92 for Kovach--- 356winning margin
Total turnout 544---- 4.1% turnout

3rd Rep District-registered voters-12,890
Sheldon won 268 to 68 for Kovach--- 200winning margin
Total turnout 337------2.6% turnout


5th Rep District -registered voters- 14,499
Sheldon won 448 to 263 for Kovach--- 185winning margin
Total turnout 720------5.0% turnout



13th Rep District-registered voters-13,421
Sheldon won 319 to 197 for Kovach--- 194winning margin
Total turnout 534------4.0% turnout


16th Rep District-registered voters-13,496
Sheldon won 495 to 100 for Kovach --- 395winning margin
Total turnout 599------4.4% turnout

This is the winning margin produced by these 6 districts:
1st Rep District(Wilmington & Northern suburbs)--margin----- 388
2nd Rep District(Wilmington)---------------------margin----- 356
3rd Rep District(Wilmington)---------------------margin----- 200
5th Rep District(Bear/Glasgow)--------------------margin---- 185
13th Rep District(Elsmere/Richardson Park)--------margin---- 194
16th Rep District (New Castle)------------------- margin---- 395
Winning margin these six------------------------------------1718


While Sheldon won by more than 4-1 in a couple districts and better than 3-1 in another, his most productive districts did not provide the turnout he needed to make the race closer.The average turnout in Sheldon's 6 most productive districts was 4.3% which was 2.7% less than the overall county turnout and ,more importantly,was 7.7% less than the turnout in Kovach's Arc of Triumph.


Jan 2011 registration totals:

http://electionsncc.delaware.gov/vr/regtotals/2011/01_11_rep.pdf

Jan 13,2011 special elections results from the Delaware Election Commissioner’s website:

http://elections.delaware.gov/results/html/stwres.shtml