Special elections not always best

The Phoenix mayoral runoff last week offers an observation for the civicminded. And no, we’re not talking about dark money, attack ads or the selling of a candidate as someone he’s not.

It is this: Democracy isn’t always best served via special elections.

Come August, that point will be proven. Two measures, one on the fate of light rail expansion and one to change how Phoenix calculates and funds its pension debt, will be on the ballot of a special election.

Regardless of how you feel about either issue, the election is hardly worth cheering.

Don’t get me wrong. Special elections are necessary in some circumstances — as in the runoff, which followed a general election in which none of the four candidates garnered enough votes to win outright.

Or with referendums that seek to stop an action taken by government from happening — as in the short-lived effort to force a public vote on the Phoenix Suns arena-renovation deal that the city council approved.

Or recall efforts to oust an officeholder — as in the case with Phoenix City Councilman Michael Nowakowski, until the recall petitions were challenged in court and thrown out, making a recall election moot.

Special elections make sense in those instances, when urgency matters.

Not so much with initiatives, unless you think it’s fine to have a fraction of the electorate make important decisions affecting the rest of us.

Greater voter participation is more than just an aspirational idea. Phoenix is switching its regular council elections from the fall of odd years to November of even years to mirror the state’s schedule. A big selling point for the switch was that it would greatly boost turnout; Phoenix voters overwhelmingly approved the change in 2018.

Should Phoenix seek another charter amendment and add initiatives to regular election cycles? (That’s how referendums are treated now, though the city council also has the option to call a special election for them.) It would save the city hundreds of thousands of dollars in carrying out special elections.

It certainly would increase voter engagement.

Perhaps as a preview of things to come, in the November 2018 special election to fill the mayoral seat vacated by Greg Stanton, voter turnout was 61 percent — more than double the historic average.

Compare that with the last time Phoenix held an election in August of an odd year – 2017 – when turnout was at just above 17 percent.

The mayoral runoff last Tuesday drew a turnout percentage of less than 25 percent. And that was following a contentious campaign that included TV ads from both sides the last several weeks.

It’s difficult to imagine a low-key special election – neither group behind the two citizen initiatives has much money to get their message out – bringing out any more voters than the election that Kate Gallego just won.

In other words, there’s a good chance that roughly 1 in 5 registered Phoenix voters will end up deciding whether to freeze light rail at its present operation and whether to force city officials to dramatically fund pension obligations at the expense of new or added city services.

Are the rest of the 1.6 million-plus of us living in the city OK with that? Should we be?