I do appreciate that. Are they all paid positions? We have local elections for Councillors who don’t get paid. I often wonder why they do it.
I genuinely might not vote. Not solely based on it being uncontested, but also because I know too little about it. In fact, that lack of knowledge might mean I wouldn’t vote if it was contested–assuming I lacked info to pick between the candidates.
That said, if it were easy to vote, I’d probably do it anyways. But it very much isn’t for me in my situation. You see, my state requires Voter ID, and the requirements for me to get that involve some documents I don’t have, and so I have to get them, and one of those requires getting another document. So it’s a huge ordeal just to be able to vote and have it count.
(I had previously been under the impression that it would count if and only if the votes were close, but it seems they would just throw it out if I couldn’t present my voter ID within a certain period of time after my vote.)
Yes, you have on this board someone who has been negatively affected by Voter ID requirements.
A post was merged into an existing topic: Gigabyte’s posts now live in the cornfield
Not at all being snarky, but I take it that you don’t have a driver’s license? Or a passport?
Correct. I don’t drive, and I’ve never had remotely enough money to consider leaving the country.
(I had my permit but then failed a driving test because the cop made me too nervous, and then never got around to retesting before I became disabled.)
Two additions to the OP.
First, imagine, that Jane, running uncontested for office X, received 6k votes in a town of 10k (and we can assume that only 7-8k voted). In the same election, Charles ran for office Y - also uncontested - and received 1k. Both win their office but, if there’s someone who was thinking of running for office but they weren’t sure which ones to run for, well…now they know. Clearly, the people are skeptical of Charles. Most likely, the new entrant will be a better option. Everyone will need to wait for the next election, for that to help, but at least it will happen and the right person (Charles) will be targeted. You’re less likely to have the new person try to run against Jane.
Secondly, there may be an option for write-in candidates. While unlikely, there may be the chance for people to override the default options that are in the ballot.
Selectman is one of the various names for a municipal councillor. Specifically, New England towns, if I recall correctly.
Assessor is a county official in charge of determining land values for purposes of real property* taxes, one of the principal revenue sources for local government. In some states, the assessor also collects the property tax.
*Real property meaning land, contrasted to personal property, which isn’t generally subjected to a valuation tax.
Why some positions are elected and some appointed usually is a quirk of local history. The positions were created in such fashion back in some distant century and ever since “They’ve always done it that way” has prevailed.
I’m not sure if any states allow for a “none of the above” in formal elections. That’s appeared recently in some primary elections, but despite states running those, primaries are private elections of the parties. Another oddity of the American voting system.
However, write-in votes are generally permitted. If you don’t like the person in an uncontested election - or even that the election is uncontested, period - write in a name. The footnote to this is that presidential elections are an exception in some states. To be counted write-ins have to be certified in some way before the election. But there will never be an uncontested presidential election, despite some peoples’ hysteria, so that’s moot.
I’m not clear on that myself. Sometimes it seems to work one way, sometimes the other.
Around here, if the office is uncontested, it’s almost certain that the one candidate has an “R” by their name. If they don’t, it’ll be some alternative party – including, occasionally, one that just has their own name on it; or some other name not related to any even semi-organized party.
We once had an uncontested election here in which the one candidate, officially nominated R, was indicted too soon before the election for them to get the ballots changed. Other members of the party consolidated on a write-in candidate and did their best to let everybody else in town know. The write-in won easily. (The indicted candidate was eventually convicted, after the election.)
I note that this used to be what at least some Republicans did when a candidate of theirs got indicted.
A town near me recently had a tied election. They considered a coin toss, looked up the law, and went for a re-run. Neither of the candidates who tied in the first round ran in the second.
We had a local election last year in which one candidate won by one vote. (I voted for him.)
You can skip that line on the ballot; or you can, in most places, write somebody in.
This is indeed a lot of it. And they don’t just send you email, they come up to you in the grocery or the library or the farmers’ market or on the street to talk to you about it.
I’m on an unpaid planning board.
Three reasons:
I find out about a lot of things going on locally that I otherwise wouldn’t hear about; at least, until I came down a given road and saw the thing being built.
There are a lot of things about the community that I can’t, for one reason or another, pitch in on. This, I can do.
If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu (who first said that?). I can’t be at most of the tables. I can be at this one.
Hah! That would be a huge turnout.
We don’t have many non-political elections around here. Judges are appointed. Prosecutors are appointed. Most county and municipal jobs are not elected. County clerk is an elected official but just about everyone else is a hired worker.
Primaries are very often uncontested. Actually almost always. We have a closed primary so you can only vote for the party you are registered for. I usually skip the primaries. Unfortunately the chances of my voice being heard in a presidential primary is basically zero since our primary is in June. At least I don’t get a lot of commercials.
For you? None. However, for the races where only one person is running, there is always the chance that a grassroots movement to get someone else elected as a write-in might develop - or, for that matter, the person running could die right before the election. Plus, of course, the ballots where only write-ins are allowed could matter to somebody.
I have seen one of these just once - the only thing on the ballot was for a school board, where three seats were up for election and there were only three candidates.
I want to say that I have seen places pass laws where, if the number of open seats is the same as the number of candidates to appear on the ballot, they are automatically considered elected and there is no election, but I can’t name any specifics off the top of my head.
In the kangaroo politics of HOAs and condo associations that’s a fairly common feature, at least here in Florida.
I mean, they’re not wrong. Not only do the schools decide the future of the community, but that kind of low-level position is where you start building up candidates for higher positions. If your party doesn’t have folks fighting for the school board and the county assessor and so on, then who do you pick for the promotion to state rep, and so on up the ladder?