OC Political

The 1st Supervisorial District special election has been set for Tuesday, January 27, 2015 to fill the vacancy that resulted when Supervisor Janet Nguyen was elected to the 34th Senate District.

In the last special election for the 1st Supervisorial District in February 2007, 77% of votes cast were by absentee ballots.  In the November 2006 general election three months prior, 48% of votes were cast by absentee ballots.  In the November 2014 general election, 61% of votes were cast by absentee ballot.

With the continuing trend of increasing use of absentee ballots in general elections, there is no doubt that special elections will be even more heavily dominated by absentee ballots, so this January 2015 special election should see well over 80% of its votes cast by absentee ballot and could well hit 90%.

Permanent absentee ballots are mailed 29 days before each election.  Well, 29 days before January 27, 2015 is December 29, 2014.  In other words, voters in this election will begin receiving their absentee ballots on December 30 – the day before New Year’s Eve.

Candidacy papers are currently available and are due by December 15.  Sample ballots cannot be printed until all candidates have filed their candidacy paperwork, so voters will be receiving their Christmas cards alongside their sample ballots.

That of course leaves the fun of when campaign mailers start arriving.  In fact, the first mailers should be arriving any day now.  Any candidate intending to send negative mail will need to do so before absentee ballots arrive, but Christmas is the Thursday before absentee ballots arrive.  Nothing brings Christmas joy to voters like a hit piece, so this may have to stay an unusually positive campaign. Otherwise, somebody’s going to endure the unusual risk of launching a Christmas attack mailer.

Former Senator/Supervisor Lou Correa, Garden Grove Councilman Chris Phan, former Garden Grove Councilman Andrew Do, and whoever else jumps into the 1st Supervisorial District race will have to utilize out-of-the-box campaign strategies to deal with this holiday-laden election schedule.

Some good news for Phan and Do: this election will not collide with the Vietnamese New Year, as Tet is not until February.