Election date change means more voters for City Council races

Candidates in El Paso’s four City Council races face a difficult challenge this year, getting people to vote for them when those voters have had little contact with the candidates and likely know little about the races.

This is the first year El Paso is electing City Council representatives in the November general election in an even-numbered year. Voters in 2014 approved moving city elections from May of odd-numbered years. So now, representatives for Districts 1, 5, 6 and 8 will be elected during midterm elections, while Districts 2, 3, 4 and 7, as well as the mayor, will be chosen in presidential election years.

A key reason behind the change was to get more voters choosing their representatives. Midterm and presidential elections in November almost always draw far more voters than City and school district elections in May of odd-numbered years. The first year of November elections already demonstrates the impact of moving the voting date.

El Pasoans cast more votes in the first two days of early voting for City Council races than they did in the entire 2015 election for the same four seats.

In the May 2015 elections, just over 17,000 people voted in City Council races for Districts 1, 5, 6 and 8. But in the first two days of early voting this year, more than 18,000 votes were cast in those same four districts. By the end of the ninth day of early voting on Tuesday, that total had grown to more than 50,000.

Most would agree that having more people participate in choosing elected officials is a good thing, but the move of election dates has created some new issues for voters and candidates.

The large majority of voters in this election probably have had no contact with the candidates seeking their vote – whether it’s a knock on the door, a phone call or a flyer in the mail. And because so much media attention has been focused on the Beto O’Rourke-Ted Cruz Senate race, voters may not have heard much about the City Council candidates.

Running a City Council campaign used to be a fairly simple process. You identified the people who regularly vote in council elections – there’s only a few thousand in each district – and then targeted them for contact. That’s not effective this year because tens of thousands of voters casting ballots this year may never have voted in a City Council election.

The expanded voting pool requires a lot more money to reach voters. That favors candidates who can raise those sums or who have money of their own. Insurgent, grassroots campaigns are now harder than ever. It also favors candidates who have name recognition before the race, such as an incumbent or someone who’s been in the public eye for other reasons.

Yard signs aren’t usually a good means of persuading voters, but in this year’s council races, they could be helpful. If voters see a particular candidate’s signs throughout their neighborhood, they may be more likely to vote for that candidate because the voters don’t know much detail about the race.

If you have a council race in your area, it is the first thing you’ll see on your ballot. Still, many voters may skip over council races completely.

The elections in 2020 may be even more challenging. Presidential elections bring out the highest number of voters (though this year’s midterm election in El Paso may produce voter numbers similar to presidential years.) That means people thinking of running for Districts 2, 3, 4 and 7, as well as mayor, should start laying the groundwork soon.

The mayor’s race will be of particular interest. In the last mayor’s race in 2017, voters were clearly uninspired by the choice of candidates and stayed away in droves. Only 33,000 people voted, fewer than nine percent of registered voters. That was the worst mayoral turnout in El Paso history.

But in 2020, the total electorate for the mayor’s race could top 250,000, more than seven times the number of voters in 2017. That likely means mayoral candidates likely will have to raise substantially more money than in the past. In 2017, eventual winner Dee Margo raised about $320,000; the 2020 race could require a mayoral candidate to raise two or three times that much to be competitive.

Robert Moore, ABC-7’s exclusive 2018 election analyst, is an El Paso journalist who has covered local and state politics since 1986.