The race to replace Salt Lake Mayor Rocky Anderson features four strong candidates elbowing each other in today's primary for two spots in the November general election, and the contest is so close that every vote just might matter.
It's exactly the type of local election that economists and political scientists believe should spur high voter turnout. Instead, pollster Dan Jones estimates that fewer than one-third of Salt Lake City's registered voters will bother to show up.
And that makes the Salt Lake City mayoral primary — like other mayoral and city council primaries around the state — a study in voter apathy.
Utah clearly is not immune to a phenomenon that has been spreading across America for four decades. The 2004 presidential election managed to create the largest national turnout since 1968, according to the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate. Still, more than 78 million Americans who were eligible to vote stayed home. President Bush received 50.8 percent of the votes cast, but that represented just 30.8 percent of all eligible voters.
Voter apathy in the Salt Lake race was evident last week when Dan Jones & Associates conducted its poll of the race for the Deseret Morning News and KSL-TV. The company's callers needed a random sample of 500 registered voters who said they were likely to vote today. Before they completed the 500th survey, they had called 861 people who said they weren't likely to vote.
"That's high," Jones said, though he also found evidence that a race seemingly headed for an even more dismal turnout now appears likely to draw 29 percent to 30 percent of registered voters because of increased advertising and media coverage.
"I think the last two weeks have helped turn things around," Jones said.
For experts, this race has everything it should need to attract even more voters. Experts "wince," Brigham Young University political scientist Kelly Patterson said, at estimates that 28,000 of Salt Lake City's 94,578 registered voters will make a decision for a city of 180,000 people.
"It seems to me in this mayoral race, there's no excuse (not to vote)," said Kirk Jowers, director of the Hinckley Institute of Politics at the University of Utah. "Two of the four candidates will advance to the general election, and fewer than 100 votes could make the difference."
Voter apathy in a close local election can seem like irrational behavior under rational choice theory and game theory. But in recent years, fewer people vote in local elections than in national presidential elections, where economists believe a single vote is next to meaningless.
But drawing people to the polls requires more than a good horse race.
"You wince a little, because these decisions really do matter," said Patterson, director of BYU's Center for the Study of Elections and Democracy. "When you're talking about a small proportion of the electorate, the rank-and-file citizen who decides not to vote is placing a great deal of confidence and power in the hands of a few citizens, and they may not agree with what their fellow citizens are doing."
More bluntly, while voting is a right, it is also the responsibility of an American citizen, Jowers and BYU political science professor Richard Davis said. They said not voting literally threatens the future of the American democracy.
"A democracy is the ability of individuals to govern themselves rather than have some other individual or entity govern them," Davis said. "Voting is a responsibility in that if people check out of the process, it is no longer a democracy. It's back to a group, a subset of the whole, making decisions for the whole.
"It eventually hurts a democracy when a small group of people play the greatest role. That is where we are today."
It's expected to happen today in Salt Lake City, and also in Provo in primary races for three City Council seats. Two years ago, only 7.1 percent of registered Provoans voted in a City Council primary races.
Those who vote are generally white, better educated, more affluent, more partisan and more likely to vote again. Studies show voting is a habit — and one that pays off, giving those who vote more access to the government and to candidates.
"If 200-plus years of elections have taught us anything in this country, it's that politicians who are elected are truly responsive to voters," Patterson said.
It starts during the campaigns, when candidates spend big money to buy lists not only of registered voters, but of those who actually voted in previous elections. Provo City Councilman Steve Turley used such a list to target a mailer that hit mailboxes Friday.
"A survey was done in Provo during the last council races, and it found that nobody, absolutely nobody has any idea who their city elected official is," Turley campaign consultant Nathan Rathbun said. "You have to spend a lot of money just to make sure they know who you are."
Television and radio can improve a candidate's positives and reduce his or her negatives, Rathbun said, "but to turn voters, direct mail is critical."
Several "barriers" drag down turnout. Registration is a hurdle, though "motor voter" laws have lowered it for many. Voter fatigue is another, with national elections in every even year and local elections in every odd year, and both a primary and general election required each time. Seemingly random school bond elections are thrown in for good measure.
With so few poised to decide for so many who will be the finalists for the next mayor of Salt Lake City, will the election really reflect the interests of residents?
No, BYU's Patterson said. "It's reflective of the interests of these voters who care enough and are passionate enough and informed enough to want to go. So, in some ways, the opinions these voters are conveying are not representative of the larger community."
The political scientists said voting can't, and shouldn't, be reduced to a straight cost-benefit analysis.
"Voting is a civic act," Patterson said, "one invested with a great deal of importance and a sense of duty, so even though many individuals know their vote may or may not sway the actual outcome, it's an act they think helps them shape what government does and is part of the duty expected of them as a citizen."
Some countries have boosted turnout by allowing voters to register on Election Day. Others make voting mandatory, like Australia, where not voting in national elections is punishable by a fine. Others give workers time off to vote or hold elections on weekends.
A boost to America's sense of civic duty is also needed, Davis said.
"We need to have more civics education in school, not just American history, but civics, where we teach students they are needed in the process."
That won't happen overnight.
"Our elections have a long way to go, especially some of these local elections and primaries, before they really reach down and activate a pool of voters who normally would not vote," Patterson said.
Jones, who has spent decades polling Utahns, doesn't see the sky falling, not in an information age that has brought the Internet, talk radio and blogs to the political scene.
"I think there's more discussion about government at every level today than at any time I can remember," he said.
E-mail: twalch@desnews.com