When the St. Louis County Board of Election Commissioners released results for the April 6 vote on the Proposition A transit tax by township, the critical importance of the African-American vote – which had been mentioned anecdotally by many election observers – was made manifest.
The county township with the highest proportionate vote in favor of Proposition A was overwhelmingly African-American Normandy, where a whopping 84.6 percent of voters supported the transit tax. In fact, three of the four townships with the highest percentage of support were all in majority-black North County. Norwood voters supported the initiative 84 to 16 percent; Ferguson voters supported it 80 to 20 percent; and Spanish Lake voters supported it 78 to 22 percent. The only township outside of North County to crack the top four in greatest proportional support was the diverse University City township, where voters supported the measure 83 to 17 percent.
A similar story can be told by comparing support for Proposition A in North County to voter support for a similar initiative, Proposition M, on the November 2008 ballot (which enjoyed no strong campaign push in North County). Despite record turnout by African Americans to elect Barack Obama as U.S. president, the transit tax was defeated – and lukewarm support in majority-black townships can be pointed to as a key reason.
Comparing those four highest-performing North County townships shows how effective the ground campaign was for the April 6 election. With no major outreach in North County, Proposition M in 2006 barely squeaked by in all four of these townships: Normandy (59 percent), Norwood (56 percent), Ferguson (53 percent) and Spanish Lake (53 percent). Overall, voter support for the transit tax in these four North County townships was at 55 percent in 2006 (34,702 yes to 28,387 no), compared to a stunning 82 percent (12,848 yes to only 2,906 no) in 2008.
This spectacular leap in nearly 30 percentage points can only be explained by the determined effort of North County clergy and some of the Black Press, in cooperation with the mainstream effort led by Mayor John Nations of Chesterfield and Chancellor Mark Wrighton of Washington University. As Thomas R. Shrout Jr., executive director of Citizens for Modern Transit, remarked to The St. Louis American, “I was reviewing the precinct-level data, and your efforts to help organize North County paid a huge dividend. My wife told me that her students and employees had told her they had heard about Prop A at their church. Great work.”
The Rev. Ken Mckoy was part of the transit proposal’s North County street team. He singled out for praise U.S. Rep. Wm. Lacy Clay, Mayor Patrick Green of Normandy and Mayor Lowery of Florissant (which showed 66/34 percent support in favor), Bishop James A. Johnson, the Rev. Ronald Bobo, the Rev. Freddy Clark, the Rev. Sammie Jones, the Rev. Michael Jones, the Rev. E.G. Shields and American Publisher Donald M. Suggs. And this education and outreach effort convinced voters to agree to a tax that affects them personally, every time they spend money in the county or city. Sales tax has the greatest proportional impact on the lower and middle classes.
In raw numbers, the higher-voting townships in the more affluent Central County delivered more total votes for this transit tax – which will indeed, as the campaign committee promised, “advance St. Louis.” And driving up the raw vote totals in North County (and North City) should remain a top priority for everyone who makes a credible case for what will improve this region, as the Proposition A effort made clear. But the crushing degree of support in North County was crucial to victory. Civic and political leaders have been put on notice – include the majority-black areas of this region in your outreach and education efforts, and you might be surprised how much easier it becomes to advance St. Louis.