An overview of Tuesday’s elections in Birmingham

Birmingham’s municipal elections are on Tuesday, which means voters will have the chance to elect (or re-elect) candidates for mayor, city council, and the school board. Thanks to our friends at BirminghamWatch, you can find a list of candidates and other resources to help as you head to the polls.

This candidate guide includes profiles of all nine mayoral candidates, along with overviews of many other races. You can also check out a sample ballot, find your polling place and review ID requirements.

Andre Natta, executive editor of Birmingham Watch, spoke with WBHM’s Andrew Yeager about the elections.

This interview was edited for length and clarity.

Let’s start with the race for mayor. Of course, we have Randall Woodfin, the incumbent. But who are some of the other players involved in this race?

t’s definitely a eclectic mix of people here in the city. You have Jefferson County Commissioner Lashunda Scales, who’s also a former city councilor. You have Juandalynn Givan, who is currently a sitting state representative. Then you have Brian Rice, who is an entrepreneur, who is based out in those cities west side. Frank Woodson, a long time non-profit leader. Then you have Jerimy Littlepage, who I believe is the youngest candidate running this time. You have Kamau Afrika, someone who’s run many times before, but a well-known community activist. as well as David Russell. Marilyn James-Johnson is running and would be the first elected woman to be mayor of the city, because you cannot forget the fact that Carole Smitherman served as mayor of city.

So you have a long list of candidates for mayor. How would you characterize the tenor of the mayoral campaigns?

I think a polite way to say it would, it has been messy. You’ve had a lot of conversations about the personalities and not a lot conversations about the issues that are top of mind for the citizens of Birmingham. Probably one of the messiest ones I’ve ever seen in recent memory. Luckily, even when it does get messy, at some point, a couple of the candidates try their best to try to bring it back, at least to calm it down a little bit, but it is still, at times, very vitriolic.

Well, we also have a number of races for seats in the Birmingham City Council. District 8 is particularly competitive. What’s at stake there?

That is an open seat because the incumbent, Carol Clarke, is choosing not to run for reelection. And it’s a pretty important seat when you think about some of the things that either come adjacent to it or in the district. You have parts of Ensley. You have the Birmingham-Southern College campus. You have development in Smithfield. And as a result of that development in Smithfield, you have a lot of people paying attention to the beginning of the creep of greater downtown onto the other side of the interstate, which is something that is probably top of mind for a lot of people because of thinking about what Birmingham could look like moving forward as you begin to see some of those population shifts happening throughout the Southeast.

Stepping back, what are you gonna be watching for out of Tuesday’s elections?

I am particularly interested in seeing how the electorate thinks about the role of the mayor. I think that we have seen both examples in recent history in this city as the mayor as visionary and as the mayor as the person who sets up a framework that allows for a vision for the city to move forward. And for the most part, the city seems to function slightly better or seems to see a bit more innovation when someone sets up that framework and when they aren’t necessarily being told what Birmingham is. I think a long time banter in town is, well, we could have had this or we could’ve had that or we should be this or should be that. And the opportunity to go ahead and see how the election goes, particularly as it looks at how an individual can help shape the opportunities for the citizens of Birmingham, is more important, I think, than anything else regarding the personalities or the attitudes or anything else. What can they do on the job?