On March 3, 2026, the City of Wichita held a special election. I asked Claude, a popular AI platform, to examine the election results as follows:
There was a special election in Wichita on March 3, 2026, concerning whether to impose a city sales tax of one cent per dollar. This was the only question on the ballot, and the only choices were “Yes” or “No.” I have a csv file with the vote for each precinct. I also have a shapefile of the precincts.
Claude responded:
That sounds like a great dataset to work with! I can help you analyze and visualize the results of the Wichita sales tax election.
Before I dig in, let me check what files you’ve uploaded.
It looks like the files haven’t been uploaded yet. Could you go ahead and upload the CSV file with the precinct-level vote data and the shapefile (typically a .shp along with its companion files like .shx, .dbf, and .prj)?
Once I have those, I can help with things like mapping the results by precinct, analyzing vote margins, creating choropleth maps showing Yes/No support levels, and more.
I responded:
I will upload. Also notice that precincts are identified with a three-digit number. The first digit is the city council district.
After examining the files, Claude asked what types of output I wanted:
Choropleth map of Yes% by precinct
Results broken down by council district
Turnout map by precinct
Interactive HTML map (zoomable, hover details)
Summary stats & tables (CSV or spreadsheet)
Blog-ready write-up for Voice for Liberty.
I chose all and assembled Claude’s output for posting. The lightly edited content follows.
Of note: I used Claude Opus 4.6, an advanced model that is available with a paid subscription.
Wichita Voters Reject One-Cent Sales Tax by Overwhelming 82–18 Margin
Analysis of precinct-level results from the March 3, 2026, special election
Wichita voters delivered an emphatic “No” to a proposed one-cent citywide sales tax in the March 3 special election. The official precinct-level results from the Sedgwick County Election Office show 42,513 votes against the measure and just 9,519 in favor — an 81.7% to 18.3% margin of defeat. Not a single precinct in the city gave the tax proposal a majority.
What Was on the Ballot
The Wichita City Council voted unanimously in December 2025 to place the question before voters at the request of Wichita Forward, a coalition of local business leaders. The proposed 1% sales tax would have been effective from July 2026 through June 2033, generating an estimated $850 million over seven years. The funds were earmarked for five categories: up to $225 million for public safety (police and fire facilities, vehicles, and equipment); up to $250 million for Century II revitalization and convention center expansion; up to $150 million for property tax relief (a four-mill reduction); up to $150 million for homeless services and affordable housing; and up to $75 million for a new downtown performing arts center.
Had it passed, the combined sales tax rate in Wichita would have risen from 7.5% to 8.5%.
Citywide Results at a Glance
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Registered voters | 252,946 |
| Ballots cast | 52,134 |
| Turnout | 20.6% |
| Yes | 9,519 (18.3%) |
| No | 42,513 (81.7%) |
The 20.6% turnout was notable for a single-issue special election, particularly given that nearly a dozen regular polling locations were unavailable and had to be relocated. The election cost the city approximately $170,000.
Click on these static maps for larger versions. Or, click here for an interactive map of turnout and results. A table of these results is here.
Results by Council District
The precinct codes in Sedgwick County’s data follow a useful convention: the first digit identifies the city council district, making it straightforward to aggregate results geographically.
| District | Reg. Voters | Ballots Cast | Turnout | Yes | No | Yes % | No Margin |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 39,958 | 8,076 | 20.2% | 1,716 | 6,347 | 21.3% | 4,631 |
| 2 | 48,620 | 10,141 | 20.9% | 2,241 | 7,878 | 22.1% | 5,637 |
| 3 | 33,161 | 4,552 | 13.7% | 801 | 3,736 | 17.7% | 2,935 |
| 4 | 40,354 | 7,365 | 18.3% | 1,123 | 6,227 | 15.3% | 5,104 |
| 5 | 49,416 | 12,947 | 26.2% | 2,145 | 10,784 | 16.6% | 8,639 |
| 6 | 39,910 | 8,907 | 22.3% | 1,469 | 7,419 | 16.5% | 5,950 |
Every district voted No by wide margins, but the degree of opposition varied. Districts 1 and 2 — covering parts of northeast and east Wichita — showed the highest Yes percentages at 21.3% and 22.1%, respectively, though even those fell far short of competitive. Districts 4, 5, and 6 — spanning west, northwest, and north Wichita — were the most hostile to the tax, with Yes votes in the 15–17% range.
Turnout Patterns
Turnout varied dramatically across the city. District 5, in northwest Wichita, posted the highest turnout at 26.2%, nearly double the 13.7% seen in District 3 (south-central Wichita). At the precinct level, turnout ranged from single digits in some areas to above 35% in others.
The pattern is visible on the turnout map: the western and northwestern precincts turned out at the highest rates, while central and southern precincts participated at much lower levels. Interestingly, the highest-turnout areas were also among the most opposed to the tax — suggesting that opposition voters were especially motivated to show up.
There was essentially no statistical relationship between precinct turnout and Yes vote share (Pearson r = 0.13, not statistically significant). This means the decisive defeat cannot be attributed to low turnout among potential supporters. The tax was unpopular across the board, regardless of how many voters showed up.
No Precinct Voted Yes
Perhaps the most striking finding in the precinct-level data is that the tax proposal failed to win a majority in any of the city’s active precincts. The highest Yes percentage recorded was 36.0% in Precinct 103 (District 1), a small precinct with just 50 total votes. Among precincts with at least 100 ballots cast, the best performance for the Yes side was around 30%.
At the other extreme, several precincts recorded Yes percentages in the single digits. Precinct 241 (District 2) saw just 3.1% vote Yes — one voter out of 32.
Comparison to 2014
This is the second time in recent memory that Wichita has rejected a one-cent sales tax. In 2014, a similar proposal was defeated 62% to 38% — a decisive margin at the time, but far closer than the 82–18 drubbing this proposal received. Jon Rolph, who was involved in both efforts, expressed surprise at the wider margin this time.
Context and Controversies
The campaign was marked by several controversies that may have contributed to the lopsided result. The Wichita Forward campaign drew criticism for a television ad that linked tax opponents to the Kansas Communist Party — an ad later pulled after backlash. A separate complaint was filed over an ad featuring a Wichita firefighter, though the fire union said it was legal. The campaign also sent a mailer with incorrect voting times and the wrong deadline for advance mail ballots, prompting a district attorney review that found no criminal intent.
Mayor Lily Wu, who had voted with the full council to place the measure on the ballot, called that vote “a mistake” on election night. The proposal, she said, “was big, broad, and fast. It asked for a level of trust many Wichitans were not ready to extend.”
Celeste Racette of the Save Taxpayers Vote No group described the opposition as a coalition crossing party lines — Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, and independents — united by concerns about transparency and accountability in city government.
The Data
The precinct-level results used in this analysis come from the official results published by the Sedgwick County Election Office. Precinct boundary maps are from Sedgwick County GIS. A small number of precincts with very few voters had their results redacted by the election office to protect ballot secrecy; those precincts are excluded from the precinct-level maps and calculations but are included in the county’s published totals.
Voice for Liberty · Data analysis by Voice for Liberty using official Sedgwick County election results