What the numbers say

Much has been made of how different parts of Newport-Mesa voted in

last month’s election.

The interesting pieces, thus far, have been these:

* Conservatives against conservative?

Newport Beach voters supported Tom Egan far more than Wendy Leece.

This has led some of her supporters to charge that she’s the “real

Westside representative,” since she won that part of Costa Mesa 1,420

to 1,337. That’s only 51.5% of the vote -- a tight outcome by any

definition.

It seems, however, that the surprising result is that Leece did

not run away with the Westside more, if she was in line with voters

there. There was also an apparent disconnect between Leece’s

conservative stances and voters in the Republican bastion that is

Newport Beach.

* Policy does matter.

Allan Mansoor, who was supposed to win his support from the

Westside, garnered strong backing from Mesa Verde, apparently because

he opposed the Home Ranch project, the bane of Mesa Verde’s

existence.

His best showings were in the Gisler and Dakota avenues polling

place, smack in the middle of Mesa Verde.

“I bet that counted for a lot with people around here,” Home Ranch

opponent and Mesa Verde resident Robin Leffler told Pilot reporter

Lolita Harper.

Of course, what those residents expect Mansoor to be able to do

about the already approved Home Ranch is a question.

Fellow Home Ranch opponent Karen Robinson is now mayor.

Also interesting, Linda Dixon, the incumbent whom Mansoor beat,

fared well in what was seemingly Mansoor’s home turf -- the Westside,

where Mansoor received 41% to Dixon’s 38%.

* Biting the bullet.

Mansoor has been part of another side story to this election:

Whether the practice of “bullet voting,” in which voters purposefully

do not vote for all their choices to keep down the numbers of their

candidate’s opponents, would make a difference in the election.

Early reports had as many as 800 or so people casting their

ballots for only Mansoor, more than enough to tip the scale in favor

of Dixon.

The precincts’ numbers, at first, seem to suggest there was a good

bit of this voting.

Some 22,494 votes were cast by Costa Mesa voters in November.

Doubling that -- as each voter could pick two city council candidates

-- should result in 44,998 council votes.

It turns out the five candidates only pulled in a combined 34,658.

So where are the missing 10,330?

Well, not necessarily tossed aside by bullet voters intent on

getting a particular candidate in, says David Wilson, a former

reporter and now employee of the Segerstroms.

He’s found that there is typically about a 70% vote in elections

like the Costa Mesa City Council race, in which voters have multiple

choices. There may be intended bullet voting, but there may also be

people who only pick candidates they know or who do not fill in all

their choices out of error.

This holds true in Costa Mesa over the past years.

In 1998, when two seats were up, about 25,000 people voted,

meaning there should have been about 50,000 votes cast. Instead,

there were 35,000 -- about 70%.

In 2000’s three-seat race, 34,000 persons voted, which should have

translated to more than 100,000 council votes. The number was just

73,000 -- slightly more than 70%.

This year, in the two-seat race, about 22,500 people voted. They

should have cast 45,000 votes. Instead, they totaled just 34,600.

That number is the highest, near 77%.

And that may signal that there was little or no planned bullet

voting on Mansoor’s behalf. If there had been, then the total vote

should have been somewhat lower than the 70% average.

Next up: a look at Newport’s numbers, and what they say about

Greenlight’s support and the backing of the incumbents. Those numbers

are being crunched now.

* S.J. CAHN is the managing editor. He can be reached at (949)

574-4233 or by e-mail at s.j.cahn@latimes.com.