The majority of Richmondites decided not to exercise their democratic right last Saturday, as only 23.75 per cent of voters elected the city's new council and school board.
Still, the 31,100 voters who headed to the polls were the first increase in a downward voting spiral that has beset the city since 1999.
"We saw some reversing of the trend," said Ted Townsend, Richmond's manager of corporate communications. "We hope at least part of that was due to the effort we made."
Only 22 per cent of Richmond residents cast ballots in 2008. In a bid to counteract people's reluctance to head to the polls, Townsend helped spearhead the Vote Anywhere program for the 2011 election.
The city spent $129,000 to encourage voter turnout, including $88,000 on the Vote Anywhere campaign.
"We allowed people to vote at any one of the 32 locations," Townsend said. "We tried to include some high-traffic locations."
Buoyed by an appearance by Santa Claus as well as a Charlotte Diamond concert, Lansdowne Centre was the city's busiest polling station, attracting approximately 1,700 voters, at least 500 more than any other spot.
"We imagine there were some multi-tasking parents," Townsend said.
While the Vote Anywhere program was a success, the city's multimedia campaign is likely a work-in-progress, according to Townsend.
"Our Facebook page didn't get a huge amount of traffic," he said.
The long-term goal of the program is to see civic voter turnout commensurate with the percentage of voters at provincial and federal elections.
It's difficult to tell just what drew voters to the polls, but Townsend said the strong mayoralty challenger, vacant seats on council and the clear, crisp November weather all might have helped drive up voting numbers.
Some of the seeming apathy toward municipal politics may derive from unfamiliar political parties and an abundance of candidates, according to Townsend.
In order to help potential voters familiarize themselves with the 17 council candidates, two mayoralty candidates and 10 school trustee hopefuls, the city mailed candidate profiles to each residence.
Townsend said the mass mailing was the second most expensive initiative the city undertook ($16,000), following the Vote Anywhere program.
Although the increase in voter turnout on Saturday was modest, the rise in advance voting was substantial. "We did see a huge increase in the number of people involved in advanced voting," Townsend said.
Close to 4,500 voters cast their ballots before election day, an increase of nearly 50 per cent over 2008's numbers.
