VIDALIA &8212; The people of Concordia Parish must have been interested in this one.

Voter turnout was unusually high in Saturday&8217;s road tax election, with 21 percent of eligible voters turning either Saturday or in absentee voting. The vote will be certified by Concordia Parish Clerk of Court Clyde Ray Webber today at the voting machine warehouse behind the Wal-Mart in Ferriday.

Given the 1,594 people that voted out of 7,574 eligible, the winning margin of 60 votes wasn&8217;t very large, a mere 3.7 percent. The high number of votes may have been the result of extensive work by the police jury, whose members sent letters and put up signs at their own expense asking for voters to support the tax.

Concordia Parish voter registrar Golda Ensminger was at a loss to explain the high turnout. She said the highest tax elections ever generally draw is about 25 percent, with most much lower.

&8220;I didn&8217;t think it would be that much,&8221; Ensminger said. &8220;I told Melvin (Ferrington) it would be 25 percent or lower &8212; that&8217;s all I knew.&8221;

Precinct 5-6 in western Concordia Parish had some of the highest turnout, with 32 percent of the 503 eligible voting. The voting in 5-6 was split, with 78 for the tax and 83 against it.

Ensminger pointed to two precincts that overwhelmingly voted for the tax and accounted in large part for the tax passing. Precinct 1-4 in Clayton voted 72-31 in favor of the tax with 20 percent of the 504 registered voters. Precinct 3-2, which encompasses part of Vidalia and some voters just outside the town limits, voted 56-3 in favor of the tax, with 17 percent of the 350 of those eligible voting.