Haywood sees high turnout, no voter ID issues
Fears that North Carolina’s new voter ID implementation would disenfranchise legitimate voters have proven unfounded — at least in Haywood County, where municipal election turnout was stronger than usual.
“Everything went very smoothly last night,” said Robert Inman, director of the Haywood County Board of Elections, a day after the 2023 municipal elections in Canton, Clyde, Maggie Valley and Waynesville. “Especially the closing of the polls. Everything was absolutely trouble-free.”
A 2022 Gallup poll shows 79% support for voter ID nationally. Currently 35 states require an ID to vote.
In 2018, N.C. voters approved a 2018 ballot measure by a margin of 57% to 43%, amending the state’s Constitution to require photo ID at the polls. At the time, Haywood County voters supported the measure with 61% approval.
A series of court challenges, however, prevented the implementation of voter ID until just this year, when the newly Republican state Supreme Court decided to re-hear a case the previous court, led by Democrats, had already ruled on blocking the measure.
The Republican court somehow arrived at a different decision based on the same set of facts.
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Argument surrounding the issue was contentious. On one side was election security, on the other, the possibility that the requirement would pose an undue burden on the poor, on minorities and on rural communities.
Haywood County doesn’t have a substantial minority population and despite pockets of poverty it isn’t considered especially poor, but there’s little doubt it’s rural.
One Maggie Valley poll worker said that several voters were surprised to be asked for photo ID when voting but had their IDs on them anyway and were able to vote right then and there.
If a person was to attempt to vote in N.C. without a valid ID — there are at least a dozen different IDs considered valid for the purposes of voting — they wouldn’t be turned away; they’d be allowed to vote, but the ballot would be considered provisional until that voter returned to “cure” the defect by presenting a valid ID, at which point the ballot would be tabulated.
There’s also an exemption form for those who have a valid reason not to have an ID, mostly those with religious obligations or victims of natural disasters who’ve lost important documents.
Inman told The Smoky Mountain News that of the 3,386 people who voted in Haywood municipal elections last week, there were only 17 provisional votes, and none of them were for lack of an ID.
“They were mostly jurisdictional, you know, people who show up to vote and swear up and down they live in town but don’t,” he said. Some others were marked as provisional due to lack of registration information altogether.
Those provisional ballots will be considered by the Haywood County Board of Elections at 10 a.m. just prior to canvas on Friday, Nov. 17. The ballots deemed valid will be tabulated and added to unofficial totals from Election Day.
Inman couldn’t immediately say which towns the provisional ballots were from, but in any event, they wouldn’t make any difference in the outcome of any race.
In Canton, challenger Adam Hatton trailed incumbent Ralph Hamlett by 69 votes. In Clyde, Kathy Cogburn Johnson fell 34 votes short of incumbent Dann Jesse. In Maggie Valley, mayoral candidate Janet Banks trailed incumbent Mike Eveland by 198 votes, while aldermanic candidate Allen Alsbrooks fell short of incumbent Phillip Wight’s total by 31. In the Waynesville mayor’s race, Joey Reece lost to incumbent Gary Caldwell by 252 votes, while Town Council candidate Tré Franklin trailed incumbent Julia Freeman by 266 votes.
All municipal races in Haywood County showed greater-than-usual turnout.
Turnout can be dependent on a variety of factors, including the number of candidates, the offices available, even the weather.
This year, across 17 Haywood County precincts in four municipalities, turnout was reported as 27.37% according to the North Carolina State Board of Elections. The last time all four municipalities held elections at the same time, in 2019, turnout was 20.68%. Prior to that, in 2015 — the last year for which turnout data was provided by the NCSBE — turnout was 23.87%.
During other odd-year elections, when Haywood County’s largest municipality of Waynesville isn’t on the ballot, turnout is much lower. In 2021, only Canton, Clyde and Maggie Valley held elections. In 10 precincts across those three municipalities, turnout was a paltry 13.81%. In 2017, it was even worse — 12.1%.
By comparison, during the last two presidential elections in 2020 and 2016, Haywood County voters turned out at 79% and 69.89%, respectively. During even-year congressional elections in 2022 and 2018 Haywood voters showed up at 58.69% and 56.41%, respectively.
