In the Lexington mayoral race between incumbent Linda Gorton and challenger Raquel Carter, some voters were concerned about the cost of housing, Flock cameras and more.
All Fayette County voters can participate in the election of the mayor, which is a nonpartisan office.
Gorton was first elected in 2019 and served on the Lexington Fayette Urban-County Council for 16 years prior to taking office. Carter is the chair of the Lexington Board of Adjustment, a member of the Kentucky Real Estate Commission and a small business owner.
Sarah Collins-Roberts, a 47-year-old Fayette County Public Schools teacher, said she was thinking about the cost of housing while casting her vote for mayor Tuesday at the Eastside Library Branch.
“I see how that impacts my students and their families,” Collins-Roberts said. “As well as, I'm a single mom with three kids, and I know that it's getting really expensive, and I feel like not enough is being done to protect us and to provide affordable housing for those that are most in need.”
Collins-Roberts said she votes every election.
Her son, 21-year-old community college student Noah Roberts, said Flock surveillance cameras, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and data centers were on his mind.
“(Artificial intelligence) has had an extreme net negative on pretty much any aspect of life that it has touched, and I mean any,” Roberts said. “I remember when it first started, people were talking about how it was going to cure cancer and jack-diddly-squat has done anything about that.”
Collins-Roberts agrees with her son about data centers and AI.
Lamontae Shively, a 26-year-old nonprofit worker, said he didn’t feel confident in either choice after attending the mayoral debate at Transylvania University a few weeks ago. He ultimately voted for Gorton, he said.
“It wasn't really because I necessarily wanted to,” Shively said outside his Tates Creek High School polling place. “I just thought that the impression that I got of Raquel Carter at that debate, it seemed like that she didn't really A, know what she was talking about, and B, her answer to everything was real estate and build houses. And that was kind of worrying to me, because her and her husband are real estate developers.”
Shively said he moved to Lexington in 2018 for college and didn’t have any complaints about Gorton.
“I think our infrastructure is really behind, and I guess she's taken steps to do that,” Shively said, “and I realize it's not as simple as ‘go fix this street,' but one of the biggest things that impacts everyone here is I don't think traffic should be that big in a town like this, and so that's a big one.”
Since he works for a nonprofit involved in voting and election security, Shively said he felt like he couldn’t sit this year’s election out.
Lifelong Lexington resident 24-year-old Isabelle Soult said she voted for Carter in the hopes of bringing a fresh face to the city’s top office.
“I just try to consider how the current mayor is doing versus what the promises are of the new election, and who I feel is going to be the best fit for Lexington and our future pretty much,” Soult told WEKU outside Tates Creek High School.
She said she knows some people think Gorton has done a good job, but there was some controversy with how she handled the winter storms. Soult also said the challenges with the roads “weren’t great.”
“I think the main thing is like sometimes getting younger people in office, cause where I'm 24, I think sometimes that's what we need in politics, cause there's so many older individuals,” Soult said.
Gorton is in her 70s and Carter is in her 50s.
Mae Proctor, a 33-year-old coffee house leader for Starbucks, said she voted on all the races with her eight-year-old daughter in mind. Proctor has seen how the availability of housing has changed in the city over time.
“I thought a lot about a mayoral debate that I saw recently, where the question came up of how do we make the city affordable? How do we make sure people can buy homes?” Proctor said outside the Eastside Library Branch. “And it was met with, ‘That is not a government responsibility. That is a person's responsibility,’ and it really changed the way I saw this election and how we are thought of as the people that live here in Lexington, and what little care is being put into us and how we survive here.”
Proctor said the rising cost of living is a big concern. She’s seen her bills go up and knows how hard it’s gotten to afford basic necessities.
Some were thinking of federal races when they came out to vote Tuesday. Retired Veteran’s Affairs hospital worker Ken Hemmer said he voted for Gorton.
“I think she's doing a fine job, and I have no complaints,” Hemmer noted.
He said he’s unhappy with actions in Washington, D.C. and cited the recent measles outbreaks as a sign the current presidential administration is setting the nation back.
