There were three elections Saturday in St. John the Baptist Parish that controlled more than $7.3 million in annual tax revenue that could benefit a gamut of public services targeting the young and old.

Entities dramatically impacted by the elections included the parish’s public school system, library system and health unit.

It’s not a stretch to say every resident and consumer in St. John Parish would be directly or indirectly impacted by Saturday evening’s results.

Despite so much on the line, less than 1 in 10 eligible voters participated: 9.85 percent voted in the health unit election, 9.83 percent voted in the library election and 9.7 percent of eligible voters participated in the School District election.

That was a dramatic drop from a month ago when 4,580 voters or 25.1 percent of those eligible participated in the Democratic presidential primary and 1,368 voters or 29.2 percent participated in the Republican presidential primary.

If we go back to Nov. 21’s hotly contested run-off elections for St. John Parish president and sheriff, turnout then equaled more than 55 percent of eligible voters.

When L’OBSERVATEUR staff members polled community residents about their election intentions prior to Saturday, many said they were unaware or uninformed about the issues.

Saturday’s unfortunate set of turnouts indicate those who rely solely on social media to keep up with current events fall behind on issues that impact their community, homes and families.

Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat aren’t news services, and the only time their users pick up local news is when they read links posted by news services, like L’OBSERVATEUR.

Special thanks goes out to those who voted Saturday. With less than a 10 percent turnout, the days of saying, “my vote doesn’t matter” are over, replaced with an age where those who do vote carry more weight than ever before.