It is often said that New Rochelle is divided politically between north and south, but maybe it’s time to update that conventional wisdom. The Board of Elections has just compiled the final, official results of the 2019 mayoral election, and they show a remarkable degree of uniformity across our supposed north-south dividing line*. Here are the percentages of votes I received on the . . .
North Side: 62.8%
South Side: 62.9%
To be sure, New Rochelleans have wide-ranging opinions about politics and everything else, but these competing views exist within neighborhoods, as much as between neighborhoods. And although there are statistical differences between north and south when it comes to land use and demographic characteristics, it turns out that folks all over town have similar priorities, values, and concerns.
New Rochelle is one city, more united than we sometimes realize, going up or down together, and we do ourselves a disservice by wrongly imagining sharper divisions than actually exist.
* Defined here as roughly Mayflower Avenue and Iona College