Citizen Group Seeking to Switch City Council Elections to Even-Numbered Years Submits Petition
A group of East Lansing residents submitted a petition to the City Clerk’s Office Monday seeking to place a proposal on the November ballot that would move City Council elections to even-numbered years, a change supporters say would boost voter turnout.
Adam DeLay and Sarah Reckhow, both members of the East Lansing Parks & Recreation Advisory Commission, were informal leaders of the 20-person group that gathered signatures from East Lansing residents over the last few months.
DeLay told East Lansing Info that 1,167 certified signatures are needed to place the initiative on the November ballot. The group submitted more than 1,400 to the clerk’s office to verify.
If the effort is successful, it would have a profound impact on local elections, as far fewer people vote in odd-year elections, when City Council elections may be the only race on the ballot. In the November 2025 City Council election, about 6,300 ballots were cast, compared to more than 17,500 votes cast in the November 2024 election, according to data on the Ingham County Clerk’s Office.
“Our view is that you have 6,000 residents shaping the politics of more than 60,000, which includes full- and part-time residents,” DeLay said
Delay said he is aware of those who believe students at Michigan State University should not be encouraged to vote in East Lansing elections because they are merely part-time or short-term residents. In response, he said that anyone who pays rent in the city or works in the city and contributes to the income tax has the right to have their voice heard.
“Some of the council members who have made that critique [about encouraging student participation in elections] spend a fair amount of time living outside of East Lansing in a vacation home up north,” he said. “Should they only get three-quarters of a vote?”
Reckhow, a political science professor at MSU, said she uses East Lansing as an example in her classes of how off-cycle elections are less representative than on-cycle elections.
She disputes the belief that voters will be less informed about city candidates and ballot proposals if they are placed on even-year ballots that also feature many state and federal elections.
“The off-cycle elections encourage an approach to campaigning that brings the same group of regular voters to the ballot each year,” she said. “With on-cycle elections, you have to campaign to a broader group of voters. You have an opportunity to inform a larger group of voters.”
When creating the petition, the group looked at similar efforts in Grand Rapids and Flint that were both successful, even borrowing some of the language, DeLay said.
This is not the first time there have been discussions about moving City Council elections to even-numbered years.
In 2023, a majority of the City Council proposed an amendment to the city charter that would have moved council elections to even years. However, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer denied the amendment, saying it conflicted “with the Home Rule City Act and does not otherwise comply with the Michigan Election Law.”
DeLay said his understanding is that the state cannot reject a voter-led petition from the ballot. If approved by voters in November, the initiative would “compel council to move elections before the end of the year,” he said.
If voters approve the measure and it is put in place, the next council election would be held in November 2028 instead of 2027.Mayor Erik Altmann, and Councilmembers Mark Meadows and Kerry Ebersole Singh would each have one year added to their terms.
Reckhow said the group of volunteers will continue its efforts through the November election, reaching out to people who signed the petition and considering strategies such as yard signs and informational events to promote the change.
“If this passes, it means that future election cycles [for City Council candidates] have to be responsive to a wider electorate,” she said.