{"id":6543,"date":"2013-11-05T18:34:30","date_gmt":"2013-11-05T23:34:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/?p=6543"},"modified":"2013-11-05T18:52:38","modified_gmt":"2013-11-05T23:52:38","slug":"no-runoff-in-hahira-plurality-will-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2013\/11\/no-runoff-in-hahira-plurality-will-win.html","title":{"rendered":"No Runoff in Hahira: plurality will win"},"content":{"rendered":"

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nThe Hahira rule is plurality, not 50% plus 1.\r\n

\r\nAccording to email to Gretchen from John Hallman with the Georgia Secretary of State,\r\ncontaining a forward from Jonathan Sumner, Hahira City Manager,\r\noriginally copied to all the Hahira candidates, Mayor and Council,\r\nand many city employees on 25 October 2013:\r\n

\r\n

\r\nSubject: No Runoff after General Election\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nMayor, Councilmembers, Candidates,\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nIn response to a question submitted to our City Attorney and myself \r\nearlier today by Supervisor of Elections Deb Cox, we have determined\r\nthat a runoff after the November general election is not allowed\r\nunder our current or even the old Charter (except in the extreme\r\nunlikelihood of a tie). The original 1912 charter stated,\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n“SEC. 4. Be it further enacted, That the superintendents of\r\nelections shall duly declare the result of said elections, and\r\nshall issue certificates of election to such persons as receive the\r\nhighest number of legal votes polled, who shall at such time and\r\nplace as may be prescribed by the ordinances of said town qualify\r\nby taking an oath to well and truly perform the duties of their\r\nrespective offices as such mayor and Councilmen, or other offices,\r\nduring their term of office, which oath, with certificate of\r\nelection given by the said superintendents, shall be entered of\r\nrecord on the minutes of said Council, and the originals filed in\r\nthe office of the clerk of the Council.”\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nWhen the 1912 charter was restated in 2010, it was determined by\r\nMayor and Council to keep as much of the intent of the original\r\ncharter as possible; to this end, the following is found in the\r\ncurrent charter,\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n

\r\n\r\n“Sec. 5.14 Election by Plurality\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nThe person receiving a plurality of the votes cast for any city\r\noffice shall be elected.”\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nIn the 2010 charter, the term “plurality” is not\r\ndefined. However, in the absence of local guidance, the\r\ninterpretation of “plurality” reverts to state law:\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n

\r\n“O.C.G.A. 21-2-501<\/a>\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n(b) For the purposes of this subsection, the word “plurality” shall \r\nmean the receiving by one candidate alone of the highest number of \r\nvotes cast. If the municipal charter or ordinances of a municipality\r\nas now existing or as amended subsequent to September 1, 1968,\r\nprovide that a candidate may be nominated or elected by a plurality\r\nof the votes cast to fill such nomination or public office, such\r\nprovision shall prevail. Otherwise, no municipal candidate shall be\r\nnominated for public office in any primary or elected to public\r\noffice in any election unless such candidate shall have received a\r\nmajority of the votes cast to fill such nomination or public\r\noffice.”\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nTherefore, the winner of the general election is determined by that \r\ncandidate that receives the highest number of votes cast in that \r\nelection, not 50% +1, which would necessitate a runoff if no\r\ncandidate reached that threshold.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nIf there are any questions, please let me know.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nJonathan\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nJonathan Sumner\r\n
\r\nCity Manager\r\n
\r\nCity of Hahira\r\n
\r\n102 South Church Street\r\n
\r\nHahira, GA 31632\r\n
\r\nPh (229) 794-2829\r\n
\r\nFx (229) 794-9310\r\n
\r\nhttp:\/\/www.hahira.ga.us<\/a>\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nSo we’ll know tonight who won the elections in Hahira.\r\n

\r\nI added the link to Georgia Code.\r\nI would have added links to the old and new Hahira charters,\r\nbut I couldn’t find them online.\r\nI did find Hahira’s own website says<\/a>:\r\n

\r\nThe town of Hahira received its Charter, incorporating the community, on October 2, 1891.\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nPerhaps there have been three Hahira charters: in 1891, 1912, and 2010.\r\nThe \r\nHahira City Council minutes of\r\n3 May 2010<\/a>\r\nand \r\n 1 June 2010<\/a> include some discussion of charter changes,\r\nand the law actually passed by the legislature in 2011 was\r\n\r\nHB 466<\/a>,\r\n

\r\n
\r\nA BILL TO BE ENTITLED\r\n
\r\nAN ACT\r\n<\/center>\r\n\r\nTo amend an Act to incorporate the City of Hahira, approved August 19, 1912 (Ga. L. 1912, p. 951), as amended, particularly by a home rule amendment filed with the Office of the Secretary of State January 24, 2011, so as to provide that councilmembers shall reside in their respective districts for a period of at least 12 months immediately prior to election and shall continue to reside in such district during his or her period of service; to provide for the filling of vacancies; to provide for related matters; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes.\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nThat bill says nothing about plurality or majority or runoffs, so indeed it didn’t\r\nchange whatever the 1912 charter said about those things.\r\n

\r\nThe Hahira races this plurality rule in the 2010 charter affects are\r\n

    \r\n
  • for Mayor: Bruce Cain, Rose Adams,\r\nthe incumbent, Wayne Bullard,\r\nand\r\nJohnny L. Stalvey.\r\n
  • \r\nfor City Council District 2: \r\nKenneth Davis, Traci Selph Davis, Zakk Cumbess\r\n<\/ul>\r\n

    \r\nUnaffected because no more than two candidates,\r\nand in fact both of these positions are unopposed:\r\n

      \r\n
    • City Council District 1: Terry C. Benjamin\r\n
    • City Council District 4: H. Mason Barfield\r\n<\/ul>\r\n

      \r\n -jsq\r\n<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Hahira rule is plurality, not 50% plus 1. According to email to Gretchen from John Hallman with the Georgia Secretary of State, containing a forward from Jonathan Sumner, Hahira City Manager, originally copied to all the Hahira candidates, Mayor and Council, and many city employees on 25 October 2013: Subject: No Runoff after General […]","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[8,602,19,20],"tags":[1484,8701,8791,8709,1972,8702,8710,12,7,7214,6],"class_list":["post-6543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-georgia","category-hahira","category-history","category-law","tag-election","tag-georgia","tag-hahira","tag-history","tag-jonathan-sumner","tag-lake","tag-law","tag-lowndes-area-knowledge-exchange","tag-lowndes-county","tag-secretary-of-state","tag-valdosta"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p585fK-1Hx","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6543"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6543\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6547,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6543\/revisions\/6547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}