Indicator: Voter Turnout

Outcome (s): Communities promoting and modeling clear standards of behavior

Why This is Important

Voter turnout is a fairly good indicator of participation in democracy. Voting is one way to model good citizenship in a community.

Where We Stand

Maine is usually one of the top few states in voter turnout; it led the nation in the 1992 and 1996 presidential elections, and ranked second only to Minnesota in the 2000 vote. Maine again was a top performer in the 2004 general election, when 73.75% of the voting age population voted, a new record high for the state. As in 2000, Maine’s participation wasover 12% higher than the national average.

These may reflect real changes between the Surveys, or they may be due in part to (1) the fact that the schools and students participating in the various years were not identical, or (2) the fact that the survey methods differed in the various years.

Data Source and Context

*This indicator will be updated after the next election year. Data through 2000 is from the Maine Economic Growth Council’s Measures of Growth 2004, available on-line at http://www.mdf.org. Those figures come from a Maine Development Foundation analysis of data from the Maine Secretary of State. The 2004 turnout figure is directly from the Maine Secretary of State’s office (November 30, 2004 press release).