Welcome back to Wonky Wednesday where I dive into the registration and election data that makes up the County of Onondaga.  For the next few months I will be taking a look at the individual 19 Towns of Onondaga.  This week I focus on the Town of Camillus.  Located in the Northwest corner of our county the Town of Camillus is one of the growing suburban towns that is helping to redfine the partisanship of Onondaga County.  Represented by three different County leg districts despite it’s small size, it is also part of the redistricting conversations we will have later this fall.

The growth of the Town of Camillus voting population is obvious in this slide.  The registration tools that have been passed since 2016 has resulted in a higher percentage of the Camillus voting eligible population to register, and remain registered.  They are also benefitting from the phenomenon of the growing suburban trend as families and professionals tend to choose to locate there instead of stagnate populations in Syracuse and rural towns.

It may surprise some to find out that the Town of Camillus is basically even in party enrollment.  Democrats nearly have caught the GOP in this once dominant GOP town.  However as Conservatives still out number Working Families parrty so there will remain an advantage for conservative Republicans in the town, however slight, for the time being.  Camillus is one of only two towns to portion themselves into wards for electing their town board candidates as opposed to all running at large.  There are 6 wards in the Town of Camillus ranging from 2700 voters to 3500 voters.  This makes it a little easier to run for Town Board as running at large can often be daunting.

There is some variation within the wards.  Ward 1 & 2 have a decidedly republican advantage.  Likewise Ward 4 & 4 Democrats have an enrollment advantage.  Wards 5 & 6 are virtually tied.  Despite some advantages in a few wards Democrats are not represented on the Town Board.  Dick Griffo in Ward 5 has run with Democratic support.  However currently no Democrats serve in town government.

Like all the towns overall Camillus is getting bluer.  A dramatic increase in Democratic Voter Registration since 2016 is a similar tale throughout most of Onondaga County and it is true here as well.  Republican enrollment has fallen slightly allowing Democrats to be on the verge of catching up.  Non-Enrolled voters are the key to future Democratic victories.  A coalition of left leaning non-enrolled as well as increasing Democratic turnout is the correct recipe for candidates for local office.

In fact we already see that coalition helping in recent races.  For all my town analysis I will be looking at 6 races over the last two elections and how the town has supported candidates.  in 2019 I look at the County Executive (GOP Lean) County Clerk (Middle of the road) and County Comptroller (Democratic Win)/  In 2020 I look at Congress (GOP win), NYS Senate (middle of the road) and Presidential contest (Lean Democrat).  This allows us to see how the town reacts in a low turnout year and a high turnout year.

What skews the results here are the residences of some of the sample candidates.  In fact Kolinski, Beadnell, Katko, and Mannion all reside in Camillus.  Still we saw that Camillus almost went blue in the comptroller race despite the residence of Beadnell.  Surely when a strong GOP candidate runs as in the 2019 CE and 2020 Congressional race the town still reverts to it’s GOP roots.  However its close race for 2019 comptroller shows the Town has a swing vote component to it.  The strong support for Mannion and Biden also shows that strong Democrats with resources can further tap into that swing vote.

In 2021 the Supervisor, the Town Clerk, all 6 Town Board members, and Highway Superintendent are on the ballot.  Democrats fill these offices by caucus and have until mid July to hold a caucus.  Interested candidates should contact Town Chair Diane Dwire about either joining the Camillus Town Democratic committee or running for office.  She can be found at dmd07@aol.com and the Camillus Democratic Committee can be found on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/camillusdemocrats

Welcome back to Wonky Wednesday.  Each week I take a deep dive into the registration and election data that define politics in Onondaga County.  Today I am taking a birds eye view of the Towns of Onondaga County.  As we saw with last week’s Wonky Wednesday focused on the City of Syracuse, the Towns actually make up over 75% of the enrolled voters of Onondaga County.  With such a large amount of voters in the suburban and rural parts of Onondaga County it is the place where Democrats need to grow to be successful.  Luckily, like most of Onondaga County, the voter enrollment in these towns are trending our way.

The Towns of Onondaga County as a whole has seen tremendous growth since 2009 in enrolled voters.  Since 2009 they have added over 25k net voters, a growth of 12%.  Most of that growth has been 2016 when online DMV registration made it easier to register.  It remains to be seen whether this is a sign of population growth or registering previously unregistered voters.  It is likely though a combination of both.

The key to Democratic growth in Onondaga County has been the rise in enrollment outside the City of Syracuse.  In 2020 for the first time Democrats outnumbered Republican voters who had seen stagnation or falling of their registrations before the 2020 election.  While both parties gained in registered voters last year, the Democrats gain continued to outpace the GOP.  Also growing in strength is the number of voters who are not enrolled in a political party.  These voters will play as decisive swing voters in County Legislator and Town races up and down the ballot this year.

Despite growing in numbers, the Democrats still only have a partisan advantage in only 6 of the 19 towns of Onondaga County.  Dewitt was recently joined by Manlius as solid blue towns that can be counted on in local and federal years to deliver voters and a have seen the largest growth in Democratic votes.  Salina and Clay have seen great swings of enrolled Democrats however has not been able to capitalize on a local level.  Geddes & Onondaga haven’t recently joined the ranks of towns with a slim but growing Democratic plurality.  Camillus is on the edge of becoming a Democratic plurality town, and probably will before the primary this year if trends hold up.

In fact there is not a town in Onondaga County where Democrats haven’t closed the gap.  The southwestern corner of Onondaga County seems to be growing Democratic with towns like Skaneateles, Marcellus, and even Spafford joining the trend like Camillus though may take a few more cycles to join Camillus in flipping.  Lysander and Van Buren in the Northwestern corner, once GOP strongholds, are trending Democratic.  However the large voter advantage that existed for decades may take significant time to count on flipping those towns.  Similar markets situations in Tully and Pompey are happening with Pompey electing a few Democrats last year. The only Towns where the GOP is holding its own are the rural towns of Elbridge, Fabius, and Otisco along with the heavily populated Cicero.  In these towns the GOP advantage in sheer numbers have grown, but the non-enrolled voters out pace them so the overall percentage of Democratic enrollment has risen, though it is a small insignificant, amount.

I will be analyzing each individual town over the next 5 months and look at how each has grown in Democratic enrollment (or in some cases not grown).  I will also look at how these towns have faired in some of the more significant races of the last two years.