VOL. 126 | NO. 220 | Thursday, November 10, 2011
By Bill Dries
Updated 3:36PM
Voters in Memphis City Council District 7 on Thursday, Nov. 10, will settle the last election of 2011 as they select the only new member of the 13-member council.
Lee Harris, a professor in the University of Memphis Cecil C. Humphreys School of Law, faces actress Kemba Ford in the runoff election that grew more intense toward the end of the early-voting period.
The Daily News will tweet early voting and Election Day results as they are tabulated (www.twitter.com/tdnpols) and will post Web stories Thursday evening at www.memphisdailynews.com.
Polls in the district are open from 7 a.m.to 7 p.m.
Harris has campaigned with direct mail pieces touting his record. Toward the end of the early voting period, the pieces began questioning Ford?s qualifications.
Ford has campaigned with yard signs and robocalls. After early voting ended Saturday, a recording saying the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees backed Ford also added that a Ford defeat might lead to a return to�?Henry Loeb politics? in the city�? a reference to the mayor during the 1968 sanitation workers strike.
In the Oct. 6 city elections, Harris finished four votes ahead of Ford in the closest race of the night, and among the largest field of contenders on the ballot. Harris and Ford were at the top of a field of 14 contenders. It was the only race on the October ballot in which an incumbent was not seeking re-election.
Council member Barbara Swearengen Ware resigned earlier this year and the council appointed Berlin Boyd as her replacement through the end of her term at the end of the year. Boyd did not seek election to the seat.
The District 7 race had the added uncertainty of new council district lines approved by the council two days before the filing deadline for candidates. The new lines added several Frayser precincts to District 7 and moved Downtown south of Poplar out of District 7 and into District 6.
The race is the second for Harris, who ran in the 2006 Democratic Congressional primary won by Steve Cohen.
It is the first race for Ford, the daughter of former state Sen. John Ford and a member of the politically powerful Ford family.
During the early voting period, 1,401 citizens voted early, 2.4 percent of the more than 59,000 voters in the district.
By precinct, the highest turnout by number and percentage was in precinct 1-00, which on Election Day votes at Greenlaw Community Center, 190 Mill Ave. Of the 4,788 voters in the precinct, 214, or 4.5 percent, voted early.
The District 7 precinct with the second-highest early voting turnout was precinct 41-03, Springdale Baptist Church, 1193 Springdale St. That precinct had 148 early voters. The third-highest turnout was at precinct 21-00, Dave Wells Community Center, 915 Chelsea Ave., with 110 voters.
Source: http://kwindur.wordpress.com/2011/11/10/voters-decide-district-7-runoff-thursday/
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