Over the course of the last few legislative sessions, we have seen local bills—and some of them passed into law, others not—mandating that local elections be changed from non-partisan to partisan. It’s a troubling trend.
These pieces of legislation, often part of larger bills with unrelated provisions, sometimes are aimed at a specific municipal or other elected board. Other times they are aimed at all local elections in one county. Most recently, the General Assembly approved a bill that would, among other things, require that all of the municipal elections in Forsyth County be held on a partisan basis. Currently, Winston-Salem is the only city or town in the county that does so.
In response, the mayors of Kernersville, Clemmons, Lewisville, Walkertown, Tobaccoville, Bethania, and Rural Hall sent a letter to legislators expressing their opposition to the move.
Those mayors wrote: “Recognizing that there is nothing partisan about fixing potholes, making sure the garbage is collected and keeping our neighborhoods safe, we strongly affirm that as non-partisan bodies we are better able to serve our residents and make decisions based on the best interest of our residents.”
It’s an important point that, at the local municipal level, elected officials often deal with issues neither incumbered by nor wrapped up in the tinge of partisan politics. Often, locally elected officials have little or no authority to affect issues that dominate federal and state politics, issues that can and do become embroiled in partisan controversy.
Neither Durham, Wilmington, Lewisville nor Clemmons will be solving immigration law in this country; we won’t be legalizing marijuana; we won’t be determining military aid for Ukraine.
As the good mayors said, we will be fixing potholes. We will also be doing our best to keep our communities safe and provide amenities that make them great places to live for residents.
Why would anyone want to bring the current state of partisan polarization to those local issues?
It is true that two of our largest cities, Charlotte and Winston-Salem, along with a few others, have chosen to elect their municipal representatives on a partisan basis.
But in my city of Durham, we have kept our elections nonpartisan, and people seem fine with that choice.
And it is that choice, by local residents and their locally-elected officials, that ought to decide the matter.
Our U.S. Constitution establishes a federal system of governance, with political power being shared at the various levels of government. The founders understood that the best way to prevent the abuse of political power was to disperse that power among many groups and many people. Those views have evolved over time to become even more inclusive of more groups and more people, but they always involved the ability of local governments to represent the interests of local residents as they considered local concerns. The principle remains the same.
While the state certainly has the power, under our state constitution, to make these changes affecting local elections, doing so is not in keeping with these ideals.
As state legislators reflect on these types of changes, it would be good for them to keep these ideals in mind.
