Talkeetna voters turn out in record numbers

The State’s Division of Elections registered a statewide voter turn out of  40.8 percent and in the upper Susitna valley, voters turned out in higher numbers than ever before. According to preliminary numbers from the State, the Susitna area had almost 38 percent of voters cast their ballots, Talkeetna 37 percent and Trapper Creek 24 percent. Talkeetna election official Roger Dupey said that the total voter turnout for Talkeetna is even higher, after absentee, questioned ballots and early voters are counted. In addition to the 375 ballots that were cast on election day in Talkeetna, there were 24 questioned ballots and 92 early voters. Those numbers also are unofficial.

In the senatorial race, Trapper Creek and Susitna clearly favored Joe Miller, with write-ins coming in second and Democratic candidate Scott McAdams trailing behind. The picture was reversed in Talkeetna, where McAdams had the majority of voters on his side, with Miller coming in second and write-ins third.

Division of Election director Gail Fenumiai originally said that write-in ballots are going to be opened and individual write-in names counted, beginning November 18^th . However, that date has moved up and counting will begin November 10^th. The count is expected to take three days.

In the race for US Representative, Talkeetna favored Harry Crawford while the vast majority of Susitna and Trapper Creek voters chose Don Young. Young managed to get almost 69 percent of the votes statewide.

In the race for governor, Susitna and Trapper Creek voted for the Republican ticket Sean Parnell and Mead Treadwell. Talkeetna turned out to vote for Ethan Berkowitz. Statewide, Parnell won the race by a significant margin with almost 59 percent over Berkowitz’s 38 percent.

In line with statewide voters, upper Susitna voters endorsed Proposition A. Trapper Creek and Susitna voted against  school bond Proposition B, Talkeetna voted for it. The proposition passed statewide.

Measure 1 would have expanded the state legislature by six more representatives, but the measure failed statewide. In line with statewide results, Talkeetna, Trapper Creek and Susitna also rejected Ballot Measure 1.

The question whether to retain Supreme Court judge Dana Fabe was answered by Talkeetna voters with a “yes”, whereas the majority of Trapper Creek and Susitna answered “no”.