I came in dead last. But 4481 voters in the Kettering School Board race voted for me. I figure I got about 30% of those voters who voted for school board candidates. 30% sounds a lot better than the 14% reported yesterday.
Yesterday I reported these results from the Kettering School Board election that show what percentage of votes cast that each candidate received. These percentage numbers are deceptively low.
JULIE ANN GILMORE 8858 votes or 27.31%
GEORGE H. BAYLESS 7577 votes or 23.36%
JIM BROWN 5811 votes or 17.92%
FRANK C. MAUS 5706 votes or 17.59%
MIKE BOCK 4481 votes or 13.82%
Julie and George have a much more solid mandate than the 27% and 23% that is indicated. I figure it is at least 57% and 48%, respectively.
Each voter was allowed to vote for as many as three candidates. If all 17,822 voters had made three choices, there would have been 53,466 votes cast. As it was only 32,433 votes were cast, so there was an under vote of 21,033 votes. An under vote happened when a voter chose zero candidates (an under vote of 3), one candidate (an under vote of 2), or two candidates (an under vote of 1).
It’s impossible to know how many voters voted for zero board of education candidates — but I think it’s safe to say the number is 10% or more. I’m going with 12% as a conservative estimate. So if 88% of the voters actually chose any school board candidate then the number of school board voters was 15,683.
These percentages are more impressive — and more accurate. They show the percentage of voters, who voted for any board candidate, who chose each candidate.
JULIE ANN GILMORE 8858 votes or 57%
GEORGE H. BAYLESS 7577 votes or 48%
JIM BROWN 5811 votes or 37%
FRANK C. MAUS 5706 votes or 36%
MIKE BOCK 4481 votes or 29%
This adds up to 207% — meaning, according to this calculation, the average voter who voted chose 2 candidates.
So, I think it is fair to say that about 30% of Kettering voters who made a choice for school board, chose me. About 3 out of 10. Not nearly enough to win, but, not bad.
