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Breakdown: Wilmette tilted toward Obama
11/06/2012 Wilmette Kathryn Brown of Wilmette, inserts her ballot after voting at St. Augustine's Church in Wilmette on Tuesday, November 6, 2012. | michael jarecki ~ for Sun-Times Media
Updated: December 16, 2012 6:33AM
WILMETTE — Unofficial precinct results from the Cook County Clerk’s office show Wilmette voters turning out in much higher numbers than many of their suburban counterparts.
Those voters generally cast ballots for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.
There are an estimated 19,334 registered voters in the village; the 14,952 ballots cast in the village indicates a turnout of more than 77 percent.
That easily tops the roughly 69 percent turnout average Clerk David Orr reported, and outpaces the 75.2 percent New Trier Township average, which was the fourth highest township turnout in suburban Cook.
In terms of raw numbers, Wilmette’s busiest precincts were at Beth Hillel, where 837 voters turned out in Precinct 24, and at Wilmette Village Hall, where 861 voters cast ballots at Precinct 33.
Precinct 33 also reported the highest percentage turnout, at 82.7 percent. The second highest percentage was at St. Augustine’s Church in east Wilmette, where 82.5 percent of residents registered to vote at Precinct 35 did so.
The lowest number of voters, 452, turned out at Loyola Academy’s single precinct, but that still represented a respectable 71.2 percent of total registered voters.
The precinct with the lowest total percentage of voters, turned out to be the one with the highest numbers; Beth Hillel’s Precinct 24. It attracted only 68.4 percent of its total registered voters.
Only four of Wilmette’s 22 precincts, three of them west of Ridge Road at the Mallinckrodt Center (Precinct 25), Sacred Heart Convent (Precinct 42) and Marie Murphy School (Precinct 15), gave Romney the win (The fourth precinct, 30, was at Community Church in east Wilmette).
Romney garnered the highest percentage of votes at Marie Murphy, winning by more than 62 percent. His other precinct wins were narrower, including a 49.9 percent win at Community Church.
The vast majority of Wilmette precincts went for Obama, with the president’s biggest margin coming from Precinct 24 at Beth Hillel synagogue in far western Wilmette, which gave him totals of almost 70.5 percent. He also won more than 68 percent of the vote in Precincts 26 and 33, at Highcrest School in west central Wilmette and at Village Hall in downtown Wilmette respectively.
A large number of Obama’s winning totals ranged between 54 and 66 percent, but some were smaller. He eked out a win with 49.74 percent of the vote in Precinct 45 (Sacred Heart Convent) versus just over 48 percent for Romney. He also had another narrow victory in Precinct 18 at Central School in east Wilmette, with 50.61 percent to just over 48 percent for Romney.
Wilmette also delivered the highest single precinct totals in New Trier Township for Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson (13 votes at Marie Murphy School’s Precinct 30). Green Party candidate Jill Stein got her second highest New Trier precinct total – 7 ballots – at Precinct 38 in Gillson Park.
In neighboring Kenilworth’s, where residents voted at Precincts 22 and 23 at Holy Comforter Church, Obama and Romney each claimed victory; Obama with 65.8 percent of the vote in Precinct 22 and Romney with 64.9 percent at Precinct 23. Just over 72 percent of Precinct 22’s voters walked into the voting booth, while 80.4 percent of Precinct 22’s voters cast ballots.
