From Room Eight:There will be three Special Elections for City Council on Tuesday and I’m willing to guess that very few voters who are not active in politics are even aware of them.
And one major reason is the failure of the three major New York City daily newspapers to report on the elections or to editorialize in support of any of the candidates.
It’s not like these elections are not newsworthy. The results of the elections could increase the number of African-Americans on the City Council by two and/or boost the number of Republicans from two to three. In two of the districts, candidates endorsed by the outgoing Councilman are running and in the third, the similarly endorsed candidate was thrown off the ballot.
People are always wondering why voter turnout in New York is so low. One reason I believe is the failure of the NY media, particularly the three dailies to report on local elections.
Voters don’t vote if they don’t know there is an election!
5 comments:
Why are these "special" elections supposed to be run as nonpartisan exercises?
The candidates do belong to one party or another, get support from that party, and will once again proudly announce their party affiliation the instant the polls close tonight.
And, anyway, the public knows and relates to each candidate's party affiliation.
That is just one reason for the extremely low turnout. It will have been a tremendous success if the voter turnout approaches 10%.
In general, I recommend that elections be conducted on April 16.
In situations like this one when there is less than a year to fill of an unexpired term, a caretaker appointment to serve the needs of the district for the interim would make a whole lot more sense and be a helluva lot cheaper for the taxpayers. To prevent an unfair incumbancy advantage for the election to the regular term, a person accepting such a "caretaker" appointments should by law be unable to run in the following election.
The Trib endorsed Julissa Ferreras, what a big surprise.
The Trib endorsed Julissa Ferreras, what a big surprise.
Go with ERIC ULRICH, that kid on the billboard!
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