- The city's clerk's office says Lansing has more than 90,000 registered voters, but only about 17,500 of them voted in this Primary Election.
- Most of the votes came from absentee.
- Watch video above to see how people in our neighborhoods are responding to the low voter turnout.
- Summarize who, what, when, where.
A day after the Primary Election, we caught up with Gerald and Margaret Cummings, a married couple who has been voting absentee for years.
“I think its much easier, we just get it in the mail and we're done,” Margaret said.
While the Cummings made sure they voted in this Primary Election, we cant say the same about other Lansing voters.
According to the Lansing’s Clerk's office, the city has more than 90,000 registered voters, but only about 17,500 of them exercised their right to vote in this Primary. Most of those votes, were absentee.
“We had about 13,600 returned and we actually didn't get about 5,000 back,” said said Lansing City Clerk Chris Swope.
Prior to Primary day, Lansing had nine days of early in-person voting, and we're told about 280 people took advantage of it. On election day, just over 3500 people came out and voted at one of the precincts.
“Thats kinda slow,” Swope said. “We have 32 precincts so that's fewer than 150 votes per location.”
Swope said for years his office has been trying to get voter turnout in Lansing up.
“We do everything we can,” said Swopw. “We make it so easy to vote. We encourage people to vote at home, early or vote in person. But, ultimately it’s the political campaigns and the candidates that make people want to get out in vote.”
General Election is set for Nov.5.
