CLINTON COUNTY, Iowa — Tuesday, November, 2nd is Election Day in Iowa and the state will vote in new mayors, city council members, and school board members across the state. Now auditors in Scott and Clinton County Iowa are seeing two different types of races. While some races have few, if any candidates running, there are others expected to draw a lot of voters to the polls.
Tuesday will be the first city and school board election in Iowa since the start of the Coronavirus Pandemic.
"We do have more write-ins for the city positions than I think we have had in the past here in Clinton County" said Eric Van Lancker, Clinton County Auditor.
He says fewer people are putting their names on the ballot for city positions like Mayor and City Council.
"Those city council and those mayor jobs are important and you make what you want to of those positions. They're still important. They're still dealing with property taxes," Van Lancer said. "They're still dealing with neighborhood issues. Cities like New Liberty in Scott County, Iowa and Andover, Toronto, and Welton, in Clinton County Iowa all have mayor seats up for grabs with no candidates on Tuesday's ballot."
When no one is on the ballot, voters can choose to write in a candidate and in Clinton County, Eric Van Lanker says it's common to see a mayor get elected with as few as 10 votes. "This year in Clinton County especially, we're going to be relying on the write-ins to fill some of these council spots."
While filling a city official position may be a struggle in some hometowns, it's a different story in area school boards. "The biggest surprise on the ballots in Clinton County this year is we actually have races in our school board director positions and we have very few races for our city council and our mayor. Usually that's totally opposite," said Van Lancker.
With this being the first school board election since the start of the pandemic some parents are using this to take on a leadership role in their child's district after some heated school board meetings over how districts handled the pandemic.
Scott County Auditor Kerri Tompkins says some parents may be taking this opportunity to make changes. "From what I can see there's things going on in the schools. Parents are getting more interested... getting more involved," said Tompkins.
On Tuesday, we will see if this passion will be seen at the polls.
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You can find out what's on the ballot in your Iowa hometown within the WQAD viewing area, click the corresponding county link below: