Running for city council, what the job covers and how to win a ward

Quick quiz. Which government decides whether a family can build a granny flat behind its house, how many feet the fence can be, whether the corner lot becomes a gas station or four townhomes, how fast the squad car comes when the alarm goes off, what the water and sewer bill is each month and how much of the property tax bill goes to the city? If you answered "Washington," I admire your faith in Washington, but you are wrong. If you answered "the state," you are closer, because the state sets the rules. But the answer is the city council, the board of aldermen, the board of commissioners or whatever your town calls the five, seven or nine neighbours who meet on a Tuesday night in a room with bad lighting.

That is the thing about local government that the cable shows never get around to telling you. The big, loud fights in Washington get the attention. The decisions that touch a family's wallet every month, and its home value, and its safety, are made a few blocks from your house by people whose names you may not know. They matter more to your budget than most of what is argued about on television. And they are decided by a tiny electorate. So let me walk you through what the job is, the forms city government takes, and how a candidate wins a ward.

One caution, as always. Local government is a creature of state law and of the city's own charter, and no two are exactly alike. Use this as a map, then check it against your own city's documents.

Step 1: Know where a city's power comes from

A city has only the powers that the state gives it, and the question is how generously. The old rule, named for Judge John F. Dillon of Iowa, who stated it in the 1860s and wrote it up in a treatise on municipal corporations, is that a city has only the powers expressly granted by the state, the powers necessarily implied from them and the powers essential to its purposes, and that doubts are resolved against the city. Many states follow Dillon's Rule in some form. Other states have adopted home rule, which gives cities, usually through a charter approved by local voters, broader power to govern their own affairs unless the state law says otherwise.

Why does it matter to a candidate? Because the first honest answer to "What can the council do about X?" is "It depends on whether the state allows it." A candidate who promises to cut a tax the state sets, or ban something the state has preempted, is making a promise he cannot keep. Read your state's municipal code and your city charter, which are usually online, and note which powers belong to the city and which have been taken by the legislature. This is the principle of subsidiarity applied to a real town, as described in Subsidiarity Is the Old Idea Behind Keeping Power as Close to Home as Possible.

Step 2: Identify the form of government

Cities organize themselves in a handful of ways. The two most common are these.

1. Mayor-council. Voters elect a mayor who serves as the chief executive, with authority to propose the budget, appoint department heads and run the administration, and a council that makes the laws and approves the budget. In a strong-mayor version the mayor has wide executive power, often including a veto. In a weak-mayor version the mayor presides over the council and has limited independent power.
2. Council-manager. Voters elect a council, and the council hires a professional city manager to run the administration. The mayor, who may be elected citywide or chosen by the council from among its members, is usually a presiding officer and ceremonial leader. The manager hires and fires staff, prepares the budget and carries out the council's policies, but works for the council and can be dismissed by it.

There are variations and hybrids, plus commission forms in some places and town meetings in parts of New England. The point for a candidate is simple: know who holds the executive power. In a council-manager city, a council member has no authority to give orders to the public works director. His power is his vote, his questions and his ability to persuade a majority to direct the manager. In a strong-mayor city, the council is a legislative body and the mayor is the one who runs things. A candidate who confuses the two will promise results that no one in his seat can deliver.

Here is a rule of thumb. If the city charter says "the council shall appoint a city manager," you are in the council-manager world. If it says "the mayor shall appoint the heads of departments," you are in the mayor-council world.

Step 3: Learn whether the seat is at-large or by ward

Council members are elected in different ways, and the way decides the campaign.

• At-large: every voter in the city votes for every open seat. The campaign is citywide and costs more, but the electorate is larger.
• Ward, district or single-member: the city is divided into districts, and each district elects one member, voted on by residents of that district only. The campaign is neighbourhood-sized.
• Hybrid: some seats at large and some by ward, or a ward primary followed by a citywide general election.

A ward seat is the best entry point for a first-time candidate, because the electorate is small enough to reach in person. Whether ward elections are better for a city is a real debate. Supporters say they give neighbourhoods a voice. Critics say they encourage parochialism and make the council less focused on the whole city. Voting-rights law has also led some cities to change their method of election, and that is a legal question for the city attorney, not for the candidate. For your purposes, you need to know which method your city uses and where the lines are.

Step 4: Learn what the council covers

The list of topics is long, and it is the reason this office matters so much to a household. In most cities the council has authority over some or all of these:

1. The budget and the tax rate. The council adopts the city budget and, where the law gives it that power, sets the property tax rate and fees.
2. Zoning and land use. The council, usually advised by a planning commission, adopts the zoning code and map, and decides rezonings, variances and conditional uses. The Supreme Court upheld the zoning power in Village of Euclid v. Ambler Realty Co. (1926). Zoning shapes the supply and price of housing, which is why it belongs in any discussion of what a family pays for a roof. For the economic argument, see zoning may be the biggest price control you never got to vote on.
3. Public safety. The council funds police and fire, sets policy through the chief, and approves contracts. In a council-manager city the council usually does not direct the police; it funds and oversees.
4. Utilities and infrastructure. Water, sewer, streets, stormwater and often trash collection. Rates and capital projects come before the council.
5. Permits and licensing. Building permits, business licences and inspections. A slow or expensive permit process is a tax on every small business and every family that wants to build.
6. Economic development and incentives. Tax abatements, development agreements and deals with employers. These are the votes that deserve the closest reading.
7. Ordinances. Local laws on noise, signs, parking, short-term rentals and a hundred other subjects.

Each of these touches the household budget. That is why the council is where, for most families, government is most real.

Step 5: Learn the budget calendar

Most city budgets follow an annual cycle. The details vary, but a typical year has these stages.

1. Fiscal year. Cities pick a twelve-month year, often starting July 1, October 1 or January 1.
2. Departments submit requests.
3. The manager or mayor proposes a budget, usually a few months before the year begins.
4. The council reviews it, holds hearings and amends it.
5. Public hearings on the budget and tax rate, which are legally required in many places.
6. Adoption before the fiscal year starts.
7. Audit and reports after it ends.

Learn the dates for your city, and attend the hearings before you file. A candidate who has stood up at a budget hearing has a story to tell. A candidate who has not will have trouble explaining what he would cut or keep.

A quick illustration of the property tax, labelled as a hypothetical, since the tax rate is the number most voters actually feel. In many places the rate is expressed in mills, where one mill is one dollar of tax per thousand dollars of assessed value. Suppose a home has an assessed value of $250,000 and the city's rate is 12 mills. That is 250 thousands times 12 dollars, or $3,000 a year. If the council raises the rate by half a mill, the tax rises by 250 times 0.5, or $125 a year for that home. Multiply that $125 by every home in the city and you see why a half-mill is a real number. Whether the extra revenue is worth it is a value judgment for the voters and their representatives, and a council member should be able to explain it in these terms. For how the different taxes fit together, see Sales Tax, Property Tax and Who Really Pays for Your State.

Step 6: Learn the zoning code

If you do one thing to prepare, learn the zoning code. It is usually a long document, but a candidate does not need to memorize it. Start with these four things:

1. The zoning map. Find your ward on it. Which areas are residential, commercial, industrial and mixed?
2. The residential districts. What is allowed: single-family homes only, or accessory dwellings and duplexes? What are the minimum lot sizes, setbacks and parking requirements?
3. The process. How does a rezoning, variance or conditional use get from application to a vote? Who hears it first, how is it noticed to neighbours and what is the standard of review?
4. The comprehensive plan. This is the city's stated vision for growth. Many zoning decisions are measured against it.

Then read the last few years of planning commission and council agendas to see what kinds of cases come up. You will soon see the patterns: the same arguments about density, traffic, height and character, and the same hard trade-offs between a property owner's right to use his land and a neighbour's expectation that the street will stay as it is. A conservative has principled things to say on both sides: property rights and the freedom to build, and the value of stable neighbourhoods and local control. The honest candidate says which he favours and why.

Step 7: Plan voter contact for a small electorate

A ward is the size at which a candidate can still see the voters. Here is a hypothetical to show the arithmetic. Say a ward has 9,000 registered voters, and in a city election about 20 percent turn out. That is 9,000 times 0.20, or 1,800 voters. In a two-person race you need more than half, or 901 votes. (Half of 1,800 is 900, so 901 wins.)

Now plan the contact. You cannot reach all 9,000 voters, and you do not need to. You need to reach those who vote, and to get your supporters to vote. Suppose the voter file shows that 2,400 voters have voted in at least two of the last three city elections. Those 2,400 are your target. Assume, as an illustration, that you or a volunteer can knock 20 doors an hour for three hours on an evening, or 60 doors. Then 2,400 doors takes 2,400 divided by 60, which is 40 evenings of door-knocking by one person. With ten volunteers each giving four evenings, the job is done. If you want three contacts per voter (a knock, a mailer and a reminder), the numbers triple, and you adjust with mail and phone calls.

The outline of a plan:

1. Get the voter file and the turnout history from the county election office. Rules for use vary by state.
2. Rank voters by likelihood of voting, and focus on the ones who vote in city elections.
3. Knock on doors, in person, early. A candidate who comes to the door in a small ward is remembered.
4. Send a few mailers with a short, specific message: the three things you would do.
5. Hold small events: coffees, a neighbourhood meeting, a walk through a problem intersection.
6. Use the neighbourhood networks: the homeowners' association, the church, the Rotary, the local Facebook group and the volunteer fire company.
7. Plan the last seventy-two hours for turnout, as described in the last seventy-two hours, a get-out-the-vote checklist.

For the win-number arithmetic in full, use the win-number worksheet, how many votes does your race really take.

Step 8: What a member does on a Tuesday night

Here is the part nobody tells you. A typical council meeting has a rhythm.

• Before the meeting: the packet arrives, often a few days ahead, and it is long. A conscientious member reads it, calls staff with questions, and visits sites for zoning cases.
• The meeting: the call to order, public comment, the consent agenda (routine items voted as a bundle), reports, the main business, ordinances and public hearings, and the vote.
• After the meeting: emails and calls from residents, usually about a pothole, a neighbour's fence or a zoning case, and, if you do the job right, an hour with the packet for next week.

The job is mostly reading, listening and asking questions. The member's real power is the vote, the question that exposes a weak staff report and the ability to build a majority. For a rundown of how to follow what the body is doing, see open meetings and public records, a citizen's toolkit for any local government.

If the race is nonpartisan, remember the point made in nonpartisan on the ballot does not mean nonideological in the council chamber: the absence of a party label does not mean the absence of principles. Voters deserve to know yours.

The objection: "Local politics is just potholes"

That is the strongest dismissal, and it comes in a polite form: the big issues are national, and local office is about trivia. Let me answer it with the two sentences it deserves. A pothole is a tax-funded service delivered or not, a zoning vote is a decision about who may use their own land and how much housing costs, and a budget vote decides how much of a family's income the city takes. If that is trivia, then so is a paycheck. And the national issues are shaped by what local officials do: the people who become state legislators and members of Congress often come from the ranks of people who served on a council or a school board. If you want better candidates for higher office, build the bench here. The ward is the farm team.

The bottom line

• The city council decides zoning, permits, utility rates, policing priorities and the local tax rate, which is more of your household budget than most voters realise.
• Before you run, learn the form of government (mayor-council or council-manager), whether seats are at-large or by ward, and what powers your state allows the city.
• Read the budget and the zoning code. Attend a budget hearing and two council meetings, and be ready to explain a half-mill in dollars.
• Win the ward by arithmetic: count the likely voters, find your 50-percent-plus-one number and plan the doors, mail and turnout to reach it.
• Say plainly what you believe about property rights, local control and spending. A council seat is the best place to practise limited government where you can see the results. Start with the checklist in running for local office, the first thirty days, step by step.