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State lawmakers may soon force local city elections to the fall ballot under legislation approved by a committee in the state capitol this week. As Mike Vasilinda tells us, most cities are fighting the change.

151 Florida cities hold their elections in November…the other 260 vote in the spring.

Now legislation spearheaded by State Representative Matt Caldwell would force all cities to move elections to the fall.

“The fact is cities are the only unit of government that don’t participate in the November ballot right now. Everybody else does” says the Lee County Representative.

The League of Cities is fighting back. Local officials fear they’ll get lost in the shuffle of a November election and get ignored by the local media. David Cruz is the Deputy General Counsel for the Florida League of Cities.

“So then the balancing act is, do you have a well informed voter going into a spring election knowing exactly who is running for mayor and city commission and knowing all the city questions. Or do you have a higher voter turnout in November and not having well informed voters on the city questions” says Cruz.

Voters here in the State Capitol waged an eight year battle to move their elections to fall. It took a petition drive, then a court suit but by the time it was done, 89 percent said yes.

The turnout in that first fall election was more than double the turnout of the election that  changed the date.

Secretary of State Ken Detzner is officially neutral on the change…but.

“We want to bring more opportunity for people to vote and make it easier for them to vote, and I think this legislation would do that. But, there are a lot of local governments that don’t feel that same way, but I feel it’s very worthwhile to have this conversation” says Detzner.

Cities currently pay to use election equipment in the spring. In the fall, it would be virtually free.

The legislation does give cities an option. If every city in a county can agree on the same date, they are free to hold an election whenever they want. Critics say  getting multiple cities in large counties to all agree would be virtually impossible.