Does KC have too many elections? Mayor proposes eliminating some races after primary
Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas and five other city council candidates crushed their opponents in the recent city primary by garnering anywhere from 61% to 85% of the votes cast in their races.
But because the city charter says that the top two vote-getters move on to the general election, the landslide victories by Lucas and the other five were meaningless. To win office, they must again square off against their first runner-up at the general election in June.
The same, in others words, as candidates who placed first and second but did not get a majority of the votes in five contests where three or more people were running.
Lucas thinks that’s ridiculous and wants the rules changed for future elections so that winning more than half of the votes in the primary would be enough to skip the general election. Of the 25 candidates for mayor or council who got a majority in the primary vote over the last three election cycles, all went on to win the general election.
That’s one of several changes in the electoral process and city governance that the mayor has asked the newly appointed charter review commission to study in the coming months.
The commission will take up his proposals and some of their own when the 10-member panel that Lucas appointed begins work Tuesday. The group got a preview at its organizational meeting last week.
Kansas City mayors are required to form charter review commissions at least once every 10 years so that city government can see if reforms are in order.
When the charter was last reviewed, in 2013, that commission suggested the mayor be given the right to hire and fire the city manager without council approval. It also recommended voters elect all 12 regular council members by district, rather than half of them citywide, to improve racial and ethic diversity.
But a council majority rejected both proposals and refused to put them on the ballot. However, the council did sign off on a charter commission proposal to adjust the election dates by a couple of months, which voters approved. That change has new city councils starting work on Aug. 1 every four years.
Lucas is once again proposing to change the dates of city elections, to August for the primary and November for the general elections, which are the months when county, state and federal elections are held in even-numbered years.
Voter turnout for city elections is abysmal. The Kansas City Election Board said just under 14% of registered voters cast ballots in this month’s election.
Kansas saw its turnout increase for municipal and school board elections by switching them from the spring to the August-November schedule in odd-numbered years. Still, fewer than one in four voters participate.
Lucas believes turnout would be even better if Kansas City held its election in even-numbered years, citing voter fatigue from being called upon to cast ballots in multiple elections, were city elections held in odd-numbered years.
Higher participation in elections would also make the threshold higher for putting initiative petitions on the ballot or mounting recall campaigns against council members, as ballot access is tied to turnout.
Recall petitions in Kansas City require signatures equal to 20% of the votes cast in the previous mayoral election. Referendum petitions require signatures equal to 10% of the mayoral vote.
Recall petitions were filed against Lucas and six other council members in 2020 and 2021 but the number of signatures fell short.
Transitioning to elections in even-numbered years might mean lengthening the terms by more than a year for those who will be elected in June to the council.
In addition to election reforms, Lucas is also proposing ways to “streamline” government. One suggestion would strip the parks and recreation board of what little autonomy it now has to manage that department and hire the director.
Instead, the parks board would be an advisory body like other city boards appointed by the mayor and the parks director would report to the city manager rather than the parks board.
A similar proposal was studied and rejected two decades ago. Former parks board chairwoman Anita Gorman said she is opposed to any change that would undermine the board’s powers.
This story was originally published April 18, 2023 at 5:30 AM.
