Cindy Bass says she’ll soon know whether her message resonated with voters

By the time Eighth District City Council candidate Cindy Bass and her husband Scott got to their polling place near Mt. Pleasant and Stenton avenues Election Day morning, they were the 62nd and 63rd people to sign in to cast a vote.

For context, the women working the Germantown Christian Assembly polls said there are an estimated 600 voters who could show up, and they estimated about 500 did so during the 2008 Presidential election.

Suffice it to say, expectations of low turnout came to fruition at this, and other, polling places in the Eighth District. Bass spokesman Joe Corrigan pointed out that one polling place in Mt. Airy’s 22nd ward had a larger than expected turnout early in the day, but right down the street from it, another location lagged well behind normal numbers.

“It’s similar to what we expected. We just have to try to get the vote out as much as possible,” said Bass, before heading over to Northwest Philadelphia’s version of the Famous 4th Street Deli gathering at Relish. “I’m not particularly worried about turnout because of my campaign. I’m worried about it because we have to have people engaged across the city. You have to get out and vote if you want to bring about positive change.”

Among the only polling-place problems that the Bass camp had heard about by mid-afternoon was a Republican judge of elections taking umbrage to video being taken inside when the candidate was voting. Bass, who is running against Green Party candidate Brian Rudnick to fill outgoing Councilwoman Donna Reed Miller’s seat, didn’t conduct polling and both candidates had advertised.

“It’s four years of talking to constituents, being out and about. At this point, we’ll find out how effective we’ve been,” Bass said. “The voters will tell us if our message resonated.”