President-elect Barack Obama garnered a lot of votes on the North County coast but tended not to do well in the area's inland communities, according to unofficial results from the Nov. 4 general election.

Among other interesting highlights:

-- One of the most contentious measures on the ballot, Proposition 8, passed in most cities and in some places by more than a 2-to-1 margin. Only three communities voted against the state constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage: Encinitas, Solana Beach and Del Mar.

- Proposition A, the countywide property tax that would have funded regional fire protection, failed to garner the 2-to-1 margin required for tax measures in all but one North County city and was opposed in the fire-prone backcountry.

The election results suggest that much of North County remains a bedrock of conservatism where many people continue to hold to traditional values and turn up their noses at tax measures.

The Obama vote caught the attention of political analysts.

Mike Byron, a Democratic analyst who teaches political science at several local colleges, said it is not surprising that Obama did better close to the ocean.

"What you have there is your coastal-versus-interior split that is developing in North County," Byron said.

Despite long being a GOP stronghold, the coast is gradually becoming more Democratic, he said.

"It's not San Francisco," said Byron. "But it's not Anaheim, either."

In that sense, North County is beginning to reflect a countywide trend that has been under way for years. That trend reached a significant milestone on the eve of last week's general election, as Democrats overtook Republicans in voter registration totals for San Diego County for the first time since 1984.

Moving away from the coast in a survey of the presidential race, McCain narrowly prevailed by a few hundred votes in both Vista and San Marcos. The farther inland one ventured, the wider the gap became.

In Escondido, for example, McCain received about 3,000 more votes than Obama. And McCain pounded the president-elect in the backcountry.

"Obama had a lot of appeal to upscale moderates," said Gary Jacobson, a political science professor at UC San Diego. "McCain, not surprisingly, did better in inland communities, which tend to be more conservative."

What was surprising to some was that the vote on Prop. 8, a measure that divided many along liberal and conservative lines, did not come close to mirroring the presidential contest.

"People who were comfortable with Obama weren't necessarily comfortable with gay marriage," Jacobson said.

While many whites, highly educated individuals and younger voters tended to be comfortable with same-sex marriage, older voters, conservative Christians and minorities were not, he said.

Indeed, Byron said, Encinitas, Solana Beach and Del Mar, which voted against the measure, and Carlsbad, where Prop. 8 narrowly prevailed, have large populations of affluent whites.

"When you get into Oceanside, the ethnic mix is considerably more black and brown," Byron said.

And in Oceanside, the supporters of Prop. 8 prevailed by about 10,000 votes, according to precinct totals from the county registrar of voters office.

"The increased African-American and Latino vote because of Obama might have doomed it (gay marriage)," Byron said. "It's ironic, but that's politics."

According to Associated Press exit polls, 70 percent of black voters and 53 percent of Latino voters statewide supported the ban, while whites were split.

When it came to the national contest, Oceanside and Rancho Penasquitos narrowly gave the nod to Obama while the first black person to be elected president won easily in Encinitas, Solana Beach and Del Mar.

The vote in Carlsbad was a virtual tie.

McCain was favored 2 to 1 in Ramona, Valley Center and Fallbrook.

When it came to the local contest, only Del Mar provided the two-thirds margin that would have been required on a countywide level to lift Prop. A. Solana Beach and Rancho Bernardo fell just shy of that threshold.

One of the communities hardest hit by the October 2007 firestorms, Rancho Bernardo lost more than 350 homes. According to unofficial results, 11,701 Rancho Bernardo residents voted in favor of the countywide fire tax and 6,085 residents voted against it.

"That's amazing," said Steve Erie, a UC San Diego political science professor who studies public safety policy. "Where were those 6,000 'no' people during the fire?"

In the backcountry, the measure did not come close to passing. Indeed, even if a simple majority had been the bar for approval, it appears Ramona and Valley Center would have voted Prop. A down.

"No" votes outnumbered "yes" votes in Ramona by more than 700, and by seven in Valley Center.

"The backcountry is an embarrassment," Erie said. "They are the ones who are threatened the most. The people who are most in danger, who would most benefit, are the most resistant."

The backcountry vote may have reflected distrust about what would become of local fire districts in a regional consolidation, he said. But Erie suggested the biggest factor was the desire to avoid new taxes.

It's also not surprising that the greatest support was on the coast, where residents are more willing to dig into their pockets, Erie said.

And folks in Solana Beach and Del Mar had to be thinking about how close the Witch Creek fire came to burning to the ocean last year, he said.

"They were in the path of the potential burn," he said. "It certainly got their attention."

Countywide, 63 percent -- or 663,709 voters -- gave the thumbs up for Prop. A.

Obama was named on almost 54 percent of San Diego County ballots, as he gathered 613,449 votes, according to preliminary results. Nearly the same number of people -- or 610,817 -- voted to ban gay marriage.

Contact staff writer Dave Downey at (760) 745-6611, Ext. 2623, or ddowney@nctimes.com.