Jul. 3—Albuquerque Mayor Tim Keller vetoed a proposal to reduce the percentage of votes needed to win a City Council seat or the mayorship from 50% to a simple majority. If the change was adopted, a candidate would win a race by garnering the highest number of votes.

Originally, the legislation proposed reducing the minimum votes from 50% to 40%. An amendment changed that to a plurality. Voters would have had the final say in November.

The charter amendment was proposed by Councilors Dan Lewis and Klarissa Peña in response to the high cost and decreased voter turnout of runoff elections.

Keller has said the change would unfairly help incumbents and reduce the mandate given to elected officials. He previously indicated he planned to veto the legislation.

What do other municipalities do?

Albuquerque voters chose in 2013 to increase the threshold from 40% to 50% as part of a citizen-led ballot initiative.

In his veto decision, Keller pointed to several cities, including El Paso, Denver and Phoenix, that also have a 50% minimum.

“Runoff elections are the norm in cities that employ nonpartisan ballots to select local officials,” Keller said.

But what do New Mexico’s other largest cities do for their council and mayoral elections?

Like Albuquerque, Rio Rancho has a 50% minimum. That was adopted in 2008. Previously, Rio Rancho’s municipal elections were decided by a simple majority, said Rio Rancho communications specialist Jaley Turpen in an email to the Journal.

There was a review in June 2022, when plurality, majority and ranked-choice voting were discussed, Turpen said, but it “did not spawn any follow-up action (or) further review.”

Chavez County, including Roswell, uses a plurality system like the one proposed by the charter amendment. There’s no minimum percentage of votes needed to secure a seat — whoever gets the most votes wins.

An automatic recount is triggered if the two candidates with the highest number of votes are within five votes or 5% of each other. That happened twice in the November 2023 local election.

Farmington also uses the simple majority system.

Santa Fe and Las Cruces both instituted ranked-choice voting for municipal elections, which allows voters to rank several candidates. Ranked-choice voting was proposed by some as an alternative to plurality, but a bill to bring the system to Albuquerque failed last month on a 6-3 vote.

Override looming?

It takes at least six votes to override a mayoral veto. The charter amendment proposal itself passed on a 6-3 vote, with Councilors Tammy Fiebelkorn, Joaquín Baca and Nichole Rogers voting against the proposal.

However, the companion resolution, which creates a ballot question to be sent to voters, passed by a 5-4 margin. Peña, one of the original sponsors, ultimately voted against the resolution.

That resolution is the piece of legislation that Keller vetoed.

Other charter amendments

Two charter amendments were approved by the City Council and should head to voters this November. One creates a process to fill vacancies on a commission that handles separation of power issues between the council and the mayor. Another changes the removal process for the chief of police and fire chief.

Peña also introduced two additional charter amendments, both of which would bring all nine city councilors onto the same election cycle. Currently, half of them would have to give up their seats to run for mayor due to the staggered cycle.

Those amendments need to go through a public hearing process before a City Council vote could put them on the November ballot.