Wake school board seeks return to 4-year terms. What would it take to make the change?
Wake County school board members hope to return to being elected to four-year, staggered terms if local elections officials don’t object.
Currently, all nine school board members are elected every two years. But school board members said they’ll ask the Wake County Board of Elections to let them transition to four-year terms where not everyone is on the ballot at the same time.
“It’s really critical to get to staggered terms,” said board member Christine Kushner. “I hope we can expedite this so that the Board of Elections can get this settled.”
The request for the change will come in a resolution that includes new maps that will be used by voters for electing board members for the next decade. The board expects to adopt the maps and the resolution by March 15.
All nine board seats will still be on the ballot in November. Voters can only pick in the district they reside.
But the school board will suggest that some of those nine districts be on this year’s ballot for four-year terms. The other districts wouldn’t switch to four-year terms until the 2024 election.
Wake elections officials are already acting on a resolution passed by the Wake County Board of Commissioners in November that will return their seats to four-year, staggered terms, The News & Observer previously reported.
Lawsuit over maps
For decades, Wake school board members had been elected to staggered, 4-year terms.
Typically, elected bodies adopt their own redistricting maps. But in 2013, the General Assembly redrew the school board’s election districts and later adopted those maps as well for commissioners.
The legislature’s plan still allowed though for four-year, staggered terms.
In 2016, the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals declared the legislature’s maps for Wake to be unconstitutional while leaving the rest of the law in place.
In response, U.S. Chief District Court Judge James C. Dever III issued an interim remedial court order changing the election cycle to two-year, non-staggered terms. Dever said the order would be in effect until state lawmakers adopted a new plan or the 2020 Census.
Last year, the state House passed legislation to return the school board to staggered four-year terms. The legislation has stalled in the Senate.
Adam Mitchell, an attorney for Tharrington Smith, which is the district’s law firm, told the school board that the interim court order has expired. Based on his interpretation, he said the school board can return to four-year, staggered terms.
But Mitchell said the school board doesn’t have the independent authority to determine the method for electing its members. He said they can provide election officials with the district’s reasoning of why they can return to four-year, staggered terms.
“Folks at the Board of Elections are welcome to do as they see fit,” said school board chairwoman Lindsay Mahaffey. “But I think if we provide clear direction to them, there’s at least some effort we put in so they don’t have to reinvent the wheel.”
New election maps
Every 10 years, the school system uses the latest Census data to redraw new election boundaries for the board seats. The maps need to be redrawn in part to balance population disparities that have grown between the nine districts since the 2010 Census.
The school board hired Mapfigure Consulting to draw up three options for new maps. Mapfigure was asked to consider multiple criteria, including:
▪ Population equality between districts.
▪ Consideration of the Federal Voting Rights Act.
▪ Using existing districts as a starting point to try to minimize changes.
▪ Avoiding putting board members in the same district.
▪ Accounting for expected growth.
The maps were presented at public hearings last month that drew low attendance.
Board members proposed revisions to the maps last Tuesday. A special meeting will be held March 9 to review the revisions.
This story was originally published March 4, 2022 at 12:27 PM.
