What does it mean?

Over the weekend, Pa Ventura had this pithy verdict on the recent Council election:

Judging from the ease with which three City Council incumbents were re-elected, the voters must like the way things are being done at City Hall.

Kevin Clerici, the Star's regular Ventura reporter had filed this analysis the day after the election:

Incumbents Christy Weir, Bill Fulton and Mayor Carl Morehouse were the top three vote-getters Tuesday among nine candidates in a largely low-key campaign without a defining wedge issue.

Low turnouts inevitably work to the incumbents' advantage, and in a race without a big issue to excite people to go to the polls, challengers "are pretty much dead in the water," said professor Herb Gooch, chairman of the political science department at California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks.

Actually, the turn-out was not as low as assumed. With more voters choosing to cast their ballots by mail, another 1100 ballots dropped off at the polls are still being tallied, boosting final turn-out by about 13% over the record-low four years ago.

But it may also be misleading to assume that incumbents benefit from low turn-outs. The Council race two years ago drew an all-time record turn-out because Governor Schwarzenegger scheduled his special election on the same day. In that race, the three incumbents were also convincingly re-elected. There may be an advantage to incumbency, but it seems to be equally strong whether the turn-out is high or low.

The second factor cited by Clerici ("lack of a defining wedge issue") may be equally dubious. The Chamber-backed candidates mounted attacks on the Victoria Corridor planning effort and City use of consultants. The union-backed candidate came out strongly against Walmart and aligned himself with the core of activists supporting a construction moratorium until they can write a "view" ordinance. But perhaps these "wedge issues" failed to connect because they were overshadowed by a much more potent record of accomplishment.

On the classic scale ("Is Ventura better or worse off today than four years ago?") it is hard to doubt the record:

• A budget brought out of the red into the black while preserving vital services
• A consensus General Plan approved
• The first increase in public safety staffing in 15 years (six additional police and an additional roving fire crew)
• Major investment in repairing streets and upgrading water and wastewater systems
• Continued downtown renaissance with new restaurants, stores and housing
• Improved quality standards for new development
• Regional leadership in environmental stewardship
• Opening of the new Community Park and two smaller neighborhood parks

Ventura has raised its standards. That means that more is expected. But is it possible, as Pa Ventura observed, that Ventura voters were not bored, but satisfied? Is it possible that in re-electing the incumbents, they were voting for change -- because the changes they want are being successfully pursued?