Spencer Thomas | editor-in-chief

Voting in an election is supposed to feel really good. It’s a right that we as Americans are lucky to have. We should be eternally grateful for, and protective of, our ability to choose who we want to represent us in government.

However, increasing polarization and media trends made the 2024 election season unbearable. You couldn’t consume or do anything without the end of the world being threatened by either party. It made our patriotic duty a stressful chore.

Despite being an odd-numbered year, Pittsburghers will be heading back to the polls in November to vote in our municipal elections, which will determine who runs the city.

It’s a choice that will be just as important, albeit with less stress on the conscience. Off-cycle elections like this one are universally beneficial, for the voters, the politicians and the outcomes.

Neanderthals who get their news from iFunny and run down one side of a ticket aren’t hitting the polls this year like they did in the last. Instead, it is people who are more in tune with the politics and people these elections will affect. The people who vote in these elections are those who feel a patriotic obligation to democracy, rather than to social movements and demagogues. This can be seen in the dramatically lower turnouts off-cycle elections have.

In 2021, the Pittsburgh mayoral election saw 30% turnout, with 70,885 locals casting ballots. Allegheny County reported over 75% turnout in the 2024 Presidential election. That dramatic difference is made up of people influenced by social pressures, rather than those who care about the outcomes of the election. Since it is a more regional office, the mayor can have just as much impact on Pittsburghers’ lives as the president, yet fewer people care. That is unfortunate, but it also means that those who do bother to vote are doing so for the right reasons.

Another reason these odd-year elections are a great thing is that they increase the feedback from the people toward their government. If it weren’t for this election, voters would have to sit through two whole years of policies from those who were elected last November, be it local or national officials. But now, votes for policies and candidates this fall can reinforce or undermine the current leadership’s actions, allowing them the chance to change course before their name appears on a ballot. They take the temperature of voters and give politicians a chance to respond. Even indirectly, these elections can help guide the course of government.

Finally, these are good for the politicians. Resist for a moment every inclination in your body and imagine what it’s like to be a politician. If this mayoral election had happened last year, the biggest test for candidates like Ed Gainey and Corey O’Connor would have been their relationship with the presidential candidates. Not only would they try to curry their endorsements, but voters would lump their platforms together. The biggest storyline of their campaigns would be out of their control and have more to do with those higher on the ballot.

That’s exactly what happened with Bob Casey Jr. and Dave McCormick in Pennsylvania. Surely a more stable Democratic Party atop the ticket would have been more beneficial to Casey, who lost the election after winning in 2018 and 2012. The cornerstone of McCormick’s campaign was grouping Casey, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris together, and that made it very difficult for Casey to survive the latter’s loss.

A 2020 study published by the Cambridge University Press found that candidates running in districts that were normally unwelcoming to their platform performed better in off-cycle elections. One can infer that this is because voters are thinking about the candidates, rather than preconceived partisan notions that were foisted upon them by countless commercials for other campaigns.

An off-cycle election gives candidates more freedom to stand on their own, and not be beholden to any outside issues. They aren’t accountable for anyone else’s words, and it forces them to flesh out their own ideas, rather than cower behind somebody else. That is good for them, and the people they answer to.

People who want to consolidate smaller elections, such as school board elections, into the larger cycles argue that lower turnout means power is in the hands of the few. They are right. It’s in the few who can be bothered to turn out for their country. Those are the people, no matter what party they are, that I trust to choose my representatives. Anyone who is uncomfortable with that is free to hit the polls that day. Your voice will mean a whole lot more than usual, and, perhaps, for once, you’ll leave with some pride in exercising your constitutional right.

No big-money influences and no noise. Just old-fashioned politics.