Voters go to the polls Tuesday to make final decisions on who will fill three Birmingham City Council seats. No candidates in Districts 2, 5 and 9 received more than half the votes cast in the Aug. 22 elections, and voters Tuesday will choose between the top two vote-getters in the race. Read more.
• The city is streaming voting results as they come in tonight. Keep up with the numbers here. • Birmingham city runoff elections are today. • The mayor’s office, three seats on the City Council and five seats on the city Board of Education are on the ballot. • Polls are open 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Throughout the Birmingham mayoral race, candidate Randall Woodfin has challenged Mayor William Bell’s record on neighborhood revitalization, contending he has neglected struggling areas of the city in favor of developing the downtown area. Bell, however, maintains that downtown development should be prioritized over some neighborhoods because it is an economic engine that brings money into the city, though his actions have been both lauded and criticized by various neighborhood officials. The issue of neighborhood revitalization has remained an issue in the mayoral campaign even as the number of candidates was cut from 12 to two. Birmingham voters will go to the polls today to finally pick the man who will take over the mayor’s office for the next term. Also on the city runoff ballot are three City Council seats and five city Board of Education seats. Read more. Birmingham City Runoff Voter Guide Three Birmingham City Council Seats Are up for Grabs Birmingham School Board Candidates Answer BW Questions, Talk Improvement Goals and Difficult Decisions Birmingham Runoff Ballot and Candidate Profiles Find Your Polling Place Research Campaign Finance
A majority of seats on the Birmingham Board of Education still are up for grabs in the Oct. 3 runoff election. BirminghamWatch asked the 10 candidates in runoffs for five seats a series of questions about their intentions toward the new school superintendent, the possibility of closing schools, their goals for city school graduates, improvements they’d like to see in city schools and the role they think the mayor and City Council should take in relation to the schools. Races on the runoff ballot are Districts 1, 4, 5, 7 and 8. Read what the candidates have to say about the issues in their own words.
Birmingham Mayoral candidate Randall Woodfin called Mayor William Bell’s criticisms of his out-of-state fundraising “false and misleading.” Bell has called out Woodfin for getting money from out-of-state donors and being supported by a national liberal agenda. Woodfin says some of that is true, but he had to go farther afield for some of his contributors because Bell during his long government career has had the backing of virtually every corporate interest. He also said there’s a fear of retribution that has to be overcome when the opponent is a long-serving, influential official. Read more.
Birmingham’s two remaining mayoral candidates have reported the contributions their campaigns have received since the Aug. 22 election, revealing stark contrasts between the candidates’ fundraising tactics. Filings submitted last week show that incumbent candidate William Bell has raised $137,000 since the election, more than triple the $42,356 that challenger Randall Woodfin has raised. But Woodfin surpasses Bell in the sheer number of individual contributors. He’s collected contributions from 327 donors since Aug. 22, with an average donation of $130, while Bell has received contributions from 59 sources, averaging $2,331 per donation. Read more.
The polls are busy this fall year as Birmingham and Alabama voters go to the polls to elect a U.S. senator, mayor, city councilors and board of education members. Here are the dates for the upcoming elections: Sept. 26: Republican runoff, Special Senate Election Oct. 3: Birmingham Mayor, Council, School Board runoffs Dec.12: General election, Special Senate Election
Mayor William Bell during an Aug. 28 meeting in City Council chambers urged employees of his office to bolster his re-election campaign and told them their jobs could be at stake as well as his. In an audio recording of the meeting, Bell told staffers that it would be improper for them to campaign for him on city time. But he told them there were activities every weekend and urged them to spread the word on social media about projects conducted during his administration. “The political survival of my administration is at stake,” he says on the tape. Read more.
Terri Michal has been declared the winner in a tight race for the Birmingham City Board of Education District 2 seat. Just 10 votes separated her from Brandon McCray after provisional ballots were counted and the vote certified Tuesday. Michal got 1,719 of those to McCray’s 1,709. Read more.
Voters seemed ready to side with newcomers in Birmingham City Board of Education elections Tuesday, as board President Wardine Towers Alexander was defeated in District 7 and another incumbent, Daagye Hendricks, must face former board member Edward Maddox in the Oct. 3 runoff for the District 4 seat. Only two incumbents – Sandra Kelly Brown and Cheri Gardner – won re-election, Gardner with 79.24 percent of the vote and Brown with 68.1 percent. Read more.
Voters on Tuesday chose to keep the Birmingham City Council’s current lineup mostly intact. Six councilors won re-election outright, while two more garnered enough votes to head to a runoff. The one council seat without an incumbent vying for re-election also is headed to a runoff — though with a familiar face in the lead. Read more.
