With the change, any city elected person’s position that would have been up for grabs in May will be extended in November. The next city elections until November 2017.
“This is all I ever hear, ‘Why are we having elections in May?’’” Council Member Yolanda Ford said of feedback from community members.
Missouri City's recent voter turnout demonstrates the greatest affect of moving elections from May to November will occur in even-numbered years.[/caption]According to meeting documents, Ford was the council member who had requested the body consider a resolution. The City of Missouri City Charter Review Commission received a request at its Sept. 12 meeting to reschedule elections, but the commission ultimately voted against the idea. However, City Council has discretion and is allowed under Texas law to change elections from May to November as long as it is done by Dec. 31.
Proponents of the resolution cited a need for higher voter turnout, more convenience for voters and lower city costs. Opponents said city issues would be buried at the bottom of the November ballot and that the switch would not necessarily save money.
“There will still be an election in May,” said Mayor Allen Owen, who opposed the resolution. “There’s school boards in May, so you aren’t saving anything. You’re still going to have to have the same polls open that we have for our elections.”
Meeting documents cited that Fort Bend County Election Administrator John Oldham did not anticipated any cost increase for a shift to a November election.
“It actually probably will save them some money,” Oldham said Tuesday.
He said it could reduce expenses for the because, in November, Missouri City would always share costs with the county. In May, he said, the cost of the election depends on which entities are participating.
He said since Missouri City has exited the May cycle, costs for Fort Bend ISD's elections would increase, for example. May election costs have ranged from just less than $18,000 to about $50,000 in the last three years; the most expensive was for $50,000 in 2016, which included a runoff.
Ford, along with council members Chris Preston, Don Smith and Anthony Maroulis voted in favor of the resolution while Floyd Emery, Jerry Wyatt and Owen voted against it.
The opponents of the issue all said they thought Missouri City residents should get to have input or decide the issue themselves.
“I’m not voting against this [as an issue],” Wyatt said. “I’m voting against this because the citizens had no input into it.”
Three members of the public came to speak at the meeting about the issue, two in opposition and one in favor of the change to November city elections.
“People when they think of elections, they think of November,” Ford said. “When we have a May election people say, ‘Oh, I didn’t know there was an election in May. I just voted in November.”
