OAKLAND – In another world, special elections next week to find in Oakland a new mayor could have been a first -rate event for a city that needs stable leadership.
Barbara Lee, veteran of the Congress and the progressive icon of East Bay, against Loren Taylor, former member of the Council with political intelligence and a chip on his shoulder? It looks like a real race – and recent surveys indicate that it has become one.
Five days before the April 15 elections, however, the participation rate is surprisingly low. Electoral officials of the County Alameda said Thursday that they had received correspondence ballots of less than 14.5% of the approximately 250,000 voters registered in Oakland.
For a context, the county participation rate was 24% per week before the general elections last November. The two elections are not comparable and a drop was largely predictable. But the County Voters’ clerk Tim Dupuis said that the participation rate was “very low” compared to other recent elections.
With days to travel, the fallout from a case of high level corruption involving the former mayor Sheng Thao seems to have overshadowed the public’s attention to the Lee-Taylor confrontation.
“People are tired,” said Ernestine Nettles, president of the voters of the Oakland women’s league. “They are skeptical about our city and its leaders … It’s just the climate right now.”
The election will choose a new mayor from a pack of 10 candidates to complete Thao’s mandate until next November.
Voters will also decide on a measurement of the sales tax, city leaders, are crucial to help to ward off a budgetary crisis. And the voters will fill in a seat of the Oakland municipal council in the District 2 which extends over Chinatown, Jack London Square and certain regions in the south and east of Lake Merritt.
For voters who have not filled in voting ballots, here are some of the biggest questions to which the mayor’s race was close to the end of the election day.
What are the differences in politics between Lee and Taylor?
The race between the two frontrunners seems to be close, but during most of the electoral cycle, they found remarkably few policies in disagreement. With less than usual to discuss, the speech around the race focused on broader political themes and the financial links of the candidates and their political history.
Both want more police officers in Oakland – at least 800, possibly. The Department is currently at around 680 sworn, although an approved measure by voters last November made the income contingent of the package required on a minimum base line of 700 cops on force.
Taylor said he could get there faster than Lee, just using money that would otherwise go to the officers’ overtime. Lee speaks more sober of an officer’s job plan.
It is also much less interested in saving money for the city by losing the workers, which Taylor strongly indicates as the “difficult choice” that he alone could make by resonating the public unions supporting his opponent.
In general, Lee promised to struggle with state and federally money before the Trump administration, which could be a high task given the unprecedented reduction in the president’s federal funding.
Lee praised his ability to generate investments in the city separately. Its land is reinforced by its alliance with the city’s metropolitan chamber of commerce and the donations of Pacific Gas and Electric Co. and the CEO of Kaiser Permanent, Gregory Adams – companies that have its headquarters in Oakland.
To what extent will the new mayor influence the city’s next budget?
The candidates hardly recognize him, but there is only one probable answer: probably not much. This could clarify part of the emergency of the elections with regard to the budget deficit of $ 140 million with which Oakland was confronted with Oakland next year.
The member of the Council Kevin Jenkins, who serves as an acting mayor, works on a proposal for expenses for the budgetary cycle of next two years of the city, which, according to him, in an interview was now “at 95% complete”.
The mayor generally offers the budget during the month of May so that the council can modify and approve the finished plan before the start of the next year in July.
Dupuis, the highest official of the Comté elections, would have up to 30 days after April 15 to sign the election results.
In an interview, however, he said that the process could end much earlier if the three voting results are easy to determine and if the city of the city of Oakland Asha Reed requests previous certification.
Then, the municipal council would be able to approve the results of the elections at its next regular meeting, which could take a few additional weeks, because the council cannot plan a special session. And only after that, a new mayor could be sworn.
Since Lee and Taylor both recommend a longer -term financial analysis – both calling for city audits, and Taylor even offering a large “zero budgeting” process – it is more likely that their visions do not take fully form before the adjustments of the cycle of the next year. Until then, Oakland is said to be months away from another mayor’s election.
Taylor insisted in an interview according to which he would always propose changes, at least, in Jenkins plan after taking office. Jenkins, for his part, said that he was open to a discussion.
Will the voting of choice classified in the result of the elections?
Lee and Taylor present themselves in an area of 10 candidates who includes the former member of Thao staff, Renia Webb, the former Olympic skier Elizabeth Swaney, the staff of the Bay Area Council Suz Robinson, the parajurist Tyron Jordan and four lasting candidates.
The public exhibition and the well -noid donors have moved Lee and Taylor from the pack away. They clashed in a leading debate last month and their supporters launched negative advertising campaigns against each other.
However, whoever experienced the last election of the mayor of Oakland in 2022 remembers that the city’s choice voting system can shape the result.
Under the version of the city of the format, an voter can classify up to five choices. If no candidate obtains more than 50% of the votes, the last candidate is eliminated and their votes are transferred respectively to the voters listed as their next second choice.
The process continues, turned by the turn, until someone won the majority.
Thao beat Taylor in 2022 despite less votes in first place, largely due to voting transfers from fourth place Allyssa Victory. In the end, Thao beat Taylor with 677 votes.
In addition to Taylor and Lee, who collected hundreds of thousands, no other candidate collected more than $ 10,000 in contributions or led a robust campaign. Lee and Taylor Pair did not falsify alliances with other candidates, as is typical in classified choice races.
But even a handful of voting transfers could make a difference if the race is tight.
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