Collin County Local Elections Brief

As is typical for municipal elections in Texas, turn out for May 9th city and school board elections was light. Only 8,539 voters cast ballots at polling locations across Collin County on Election Day, May 9th.

The lion's share of Collin County voters (64.2%) cast their ballots during the early voting period. Only 35.8% of the 23,875 total ballots cast in the county were cast on Election Day.  Only 5.1 percent of Collin County's 470k currently registered voters turned out to cast ballots in the various local elections across the county.

The Collin College place 7 board of trustees race goes to a county wide runoff election between Jim Orr and Collin Kennedy. Early voting will run the first week of June, with election day held on the second Saturday of June.

Plano's Equal Rights ordinance revision last December was a central controversy for the Plano city council and other races.  The Plano City Council updated Plano's equal rights ordinance to prohibit discrimination against people because of their military status, genetic information, sexual orientation or gender identity when it comes to housing, employment and public accommodations. The ordinance provides exemptions for schools, private clubs and religious, political and nonprofit organizations, except those that receive city grants. Public restrooms are excluded from the ordinance. Violations are a misdemeanor, subject to fines. The ordinance was originally passed more than 15 years ago.

Early Voting Turnout Numbers For Collin County

Early voting for the May 9 election across Collin County closed Tuesday with fewer people voting this year than in the last local election year. Only 15,336 (3.24%) of the county's almost 473,000 registered voters cast early ballots this year.

As expected, the last day of early voting had the heaviest turn out with 3,824 of voters across all of Collin County's local districts casting in-person ballots on Tuesday.  Daily early county wide vote counts: M-1,309; T-1,139; W-1,335; TH-1,672; F-1,751; S-1,739; M-2,570; and T-3,824.  (see table at bottom for city by city breakout numbers.)

The average age of early voters across Collin County is 57 yrs, but in some districts the average voter age tops 60 years.  Sixty percent of early Collin Co voters have a strong Republican Party primary affiliation history, eighteen percent have a Democratic Party primary affiliation history, and the remaining voters, average age 47 yrs, have no party affiliation history.

Plano ISD, which includes 189,267 registered voters across northern portions of the cities of Dallas and Richardson and parts of the cities of Allen, Carrollton, Garland, Lucas, Murphy, Parker and Wylie, is the largest single local election district in Collin Co. and accounted for almost 44 percent of the total early ballots cast in the county, with 6,685 (3.5%) of PISD registered voters casting early ballots.  The Frisco, McKinney, Allen, and other independent school districts across Collin County are smaller bases of population and registered voters.

Texas Online Voter Registration Killed By Harris Co Republicans

As reported here last Sunday, Texas could have become the 27th state to allow online voter registration, if the House Elections Committee had passed HB 76, or a twin online registration bill HB 953, on to the House floor after the committee heard testimony on the bills on April 27th.  HB 76, originally submitted by Elections Committee member Rep. Celia Israel (D-Austin), has bipartisan support with a majority of House Representatives from both parties signing on as co-sponsors.

Rep. Israel said Friday afternoon, May 1st, both bills are dead in the Elections Committee. House Elections Committee Chair, Jodie Laubenburg (HD 89 - Plano), will allow the bills to die, pending in her committee, until this legislative session adjourns. The committee will not pass either bill on to the House floor for consideration.