PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — The mayor’s race has dominated attention in Philadelphia’s Democratic primary, but voters face an arguably harder choice in the City Council at-large race, where 27 candidates are running for five seats.
Each district council member serves one part of the city. They only have to get elected in that part. At-large members serve the whole city and thus run citywide.
Because so many council at-large members resigned to run for mayor, there are two open seats, which has attracted a lot of hopefuls.
Derek Green, one of those at-large members who resigned, said the task vindicates his push for new systems, such as ranked-choice voting, where voters can pick two or three candidates for each position in what amounts to an instant run-off.
“I think it would be a better system to engage more people to participate in our voting process,” he said. “It would be a much more fair process.”
State action would be needed for those changes. As it is, most voters will depend on the recommendations of others, primarily the party officials who hand out sample ballots at polling places. But many candidates have distinguished themselves and are mailing information to voters. One even has a TV ad.
Three seats have already been filled in a special election, including two who have served almost a full term and have track records. Others have served in unelected positions in the city or run nonprofits. Some seem out for a lark.
Council President Darrell Clarke trusts his ward leaders have done the work to choose the candidates they will be recommending on their sample ballots.
“It’s not necessarily the greatest way of making a selection, but given what you’d have to do to research all of these candidates, a lot of people are left to that process,” he said. “I just hope whoever gets elected, we continue to have a strong institution we built over a period of years.”
For more primary election information, many candidates filled out questionnaires about themselves for the Committee of Seventy and Reclaim Philadelphia.
Learn more about the at-large seats in this episode of KYW Newsradio’s original podcast, and hear more about other city candidates in “Who’s Running for Philly Mayor?”