2009 Election Cost Estimates

INFORMATION RELEASE Contact: Tom Slockett Johnson County Auditor and Commissioner of Elections Phone: (319) 356-6004 Date: November 23, 2009 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Cost Figures from May 5 Sales Tax Election As the January 19, 2010 special election for county supervisor has been announced, considerable attention has been focused on the cost of the election. Initial predictions of election cost for the special supervisor election were made with much less information than is now available. Election costs vary with turnout, and turnout varies by time of year, number of candidates, level of activity by political parties and organizations, campaign expenditures and activity, news media interest, and many other external factors. As an example of how much turnout may vary, the six county-wide special elections in Johnson County in the past 15 years have ranged from 7,393 voters (12.5% turnout) to 15,692 voters (25% turnout). In our most recent county-wide special election, the May 5, 2009 Local Option Sales and Services Tax (LOSST) election, incremental costs totaled $88,889.85. By far the largest single cost of the May election was wages for election day precinct officials. An itemized list of May 5 election costs is attached. This is a useful overview of costs in the most recent similar election, but it is not a prediction of the cost of the January 19 election. Many of the factors needed to estimate those costs are still not available.

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May 5, 2009 LOSST Election Expenditures FT Wages - Equipment Setup & Delivery FT Wages - Overtime PT Wages FICA IPERS Precinct Official Wages Precinct Official Wages - Satellites Precinct Official Mileage Precinct Official Mileage - Satellites Telephones & Modem Lines Cell Phones Precinct Official Cell Phones - Satellites Polling Place Rental Voting Equipment Delivery Truck Rental Postage Official Publications Printing - Ballots, Manuals, Registers Envelopes, Seals, Copies & Misc. Supplies

2,449.63 5,223.40 1,183.50 677.52 487.24 53,143.50 3,573.50 3,761.42 279.41 944.73 1,140.00 130.00 1,410.00 1,308.60 552.71 917.64 10,547.47 1,159.58

Total

88,889.85

NOTE: This breakdown includes all the costs directly attributable to the May 5, 2009 Local Option Sales and Services Tax election. It does not include the regularly scheduled hours for the five full-time elections staff members, with the exception of voting equipment programming, testing and delivery which were tracked for billing purposes. The elections staff members spent the majority of their time for several weeks prior to Election Day on preparations for the election. Therefore the actual costs for the election were higher than what is shown here.

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