Kendall Stanley: Going purple
I love numbers, especially when it comes to elections and how voters cast their ballots, a habit I’ve had since I’ve covered elections for neigh on 50 years.
Recently, I’ve been helped and my numbers expanded through the efforts of Scott T. LaDeur, a Ph.D professor of political science at North Central Michigan College. As part of the college’s Luncheon Lecture series recently he took a look at the 2022 election.
What drew my attention was some areas of Emmet County are no longer Republican but are turning purple heading to Democratic blue. Some other areas of the county are becoming increasingly red, so there’s that for those keeping score.
According to Scott’s figures, voters in the county in 2012 favored the Republican candidates 58-40, an 18-plus spread. It was even wider in 2014, when it was 62-35, or a 27 point spread favoring Republicans.
In 2022, 50-48 Republican for a 2-point spread.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer got 96 percent of President Joe Biden’s vote total in 2020, while Tudor Dixon got 79 percent of Trump’s voters.
He took a look at four townships and the two cities in the county that had some interesting statistics.
While remaining in the Republican camp, Little and West Traverse townships have been steadily moving to the Democratic side.
Little Traverse was plus 20 for Republicans in 2012, but starting in 2018 that support waned, down to 9 points, then 10 and finally to the 2-point edge in 2022.
In West Traverse, voters were hot red in 2012, with a 32-point lead over the Democrats. But as was the case in Little Traverse Township, since 2018 the point spread has dropped from 19 to 14 to 6.
Surrounding the village of Pellston, McKinley and Maple River townships continue their conservative ways.
McKinley Township was 16 points in favor of Republicans in 2012, jumping to 25 points in ’22. For Maple River the numbers were similar, 18 points in 2012 and 21 points this past year. Not showing much inroads by Democrats in those townships.
Both Petoskey and Harbor Springs, and especially Petoskey, are solid blue.
Petoskey was barely Republican in 2012, with 1.3 Republican lead over Democrats. In 2022? 23 points in favor of Democrats, a trend that began in 2016 and hasn’t let up.
Harbor Springs was 12-points more for the Republicans in 2012, and 8-points in favor of Democrats this past year. The city has voted Democratic in the last two elections.
If you tie all four of the precincts around Little Traverse Bay — West and Little Traverse townships and the two cities — it’s beginning to look purple/blue for that part of Emmet County.
Absent any inquiries into why people voted the way they did, it will be interesting to see if the trend toward more blue voting will take place in the county. No doubt following the election Scott will have his thoughts about how the election went and how Emmet County is shaping up electorially.
End of an era
The death just before Christmas of Ed Koza of Harbor Springs marks the end of the group that 50 years ago in 1972 founded the Little Traverse Conservancy. Along with co-founders Dave Irish, John Tanton, Seberon “Boo” Litzenburger, Frank Pierce, John Fischer and Earl Larson, Ed brought into being what is widely considered one of the top nature conservancies in the country. He was the last of the founders before his death.
Ed served on many boards and commissions over the years he spent in Harbor Springs but the conservancy is a legacy that has and will impact Northern Michigan for decades to come.
In the recently published Visioning Edition of the conservancy, executive director Kieran Fleming noted “Some of the conservancy’s iconic projects have Ed’s fingerprints on them such as the Naas, Mauger, Raunecker and Leslie Nature Preserve as well as Sally and Ian Bund’s Angell Farm.”
As a tribute to the family and giving a nod to Ed’s early career in the wood products industry, the conservancy has named a working forest preserve in central Emmet County the Koza Family Working Forest Reserve.
And the work of the conservancy carries on …
— Kendall P. Stanley is retired editor of the News-Review. He can be contacted at kendallstanley@charter.net. The opinions expressed in this column are those of the writer and not necessarily of the Petoskey News-Review or its employees.
This article originally appeared on The Petoskey News-Review: Kendall Stanley: Going purple
