Sharon Materio had the advantage of incumbency from being a West Palm Beach city commissioner since 2013. She raised more money than her opponent. She had support from the local police union, government workers union, Palm Beach billionaire developer Jeff Greene, Brightline's parent company, and two Palm Beach County commissioners, campaign donor reports show. But despite establishment backing, political newcomer Christina Lambert narrowly beat Materio 51-49 percent in Tuesday night's commissioner election. Recently-released election data reveals how.



This map made by 561 News shows West Palm Beach's political divide and political apathy. On one side is the city's downtown and middle- and upper-class neighborhoods south of Okeechobee Boulevard or east of U.S. 1 along the waterfront. Voters there overwhelmingly supported Materio -- in some places by as much as 2-to-1. On the other side is the poorer northern neighborhoods and wealthy communities west of Interstate 95, where Lambert got most of her vote.



One area that typically makes up a big part of West Palm's electorate in local elections is the sprawling golf course subdivision called Ibis, whose precinct number is 6066, west of the Florida Turnpike along Northlake Boulevard. On Tuesday, 594 of Ibis's rich residents voted -- most of them for Lambert. That number in that one community almost equals the number of ballots cast in West Palm's Southend, a Materio stronghold. For years, Ibis residents have complained about the federal and state governments' efforts to extend State Road 7 to Northlake along the western edge of their neighborhood. In response to this powerful voting bloc, former Ibis resident-turned-Mayor Jeri Muoio, with other commissioners, have for years voted to spend more than $2.3 million in taxpayer money fighting those efforts in court -- and the city has lost those cases. Still, no road runs along Ibis.



Materio angered Ibis residents by voting for a budget that included money for the State Road 7 extension. Muoio supported Lambert. And while Materio's vote against a controversial waterfront skyscraper in September and her general popularity among downtown residents kept her numbers up east of I-95, not enough voters from pro-Materio areas turned out to counter the anti-Materio forces of the west.



561 News has also made this map showing the size of the vote in each precinct, along with what portion of their registered voters cast ballots. Although Democratic enthusiasm for voting has increased since Donald Trump became president, Tuesday's election attracted only 7,577 of West Palm's mostly-Democratic 66,000 registered voters, county records show. Many of those votes came from west of I-95, even though more people registered to vote live east of the highway. Lambert got 3,833 votes, or about six percent of West Palm residents on the voter rolls. Delray Beach, which has almost 46,000 registered voters, turned out 8,600 in its city commission races Tuesday.