While national races demand the most attention in a typical election years, it’s crucial that voters understand how the results of the local — and state — elections will affect them as well.

“The government that is closest to you, like municipal government, school boards, and county government … they have more of an effect on you than the national government does,” explained Jim Klein, a Corpus Christi City Council Member at Large and Professor of History at Del Mar College. “The city does things like determining what the water rates are going to be, what shape the roads are going to be in … so it affects people on a more personal level than the federal government does.”

Corpus Christi voters had four propositions on the ballot, focusing on streets, parks and recreational facilities, public safety facilities and city cultural facilities. Two sales tax reauthorizations would repurpose two expiring sales taxes, one to fund improvements to the American Bank Center arena and some other downtown cultural event spaces, and the other funding improvements to the downtown seawall.  All six items were approved by voters, with varying degrees of support. A complete list of the propositions are available on the City of Corpus Christi website at https://www.cctexas.com/bond2024.

In addition to the city propositions, the Corpus Christi City Council was on the ballot, including the Mayor and all eight council seats.

The three new at-large council members are Carolyn Vaughn with 17.21% of the votes, Mark Scott with 16.36%, and Roland Barrera with 12.76% of the vote. Barrera is currently the District 3 councilman. Vaughn and Scott had both previously served as council members. District 2 incumbent Sylvia Campos was relected in a close race with the former District 2 representative Ben Molina. Eric Cantu beat out Albert Carillo III for the District 3 seat. Incumbent Gil Hernandez beat out challenger David Pena for the District 5 seat.

The mayoral race and District 1 and District 4 races will all go to a runoff, as no candidate received more than 50% of the vote. Incumbent Mayor Paulette Guajardo, who received 47.64% of the vote, will face Councilman Michael Hunter, who received 34.64%. In District 1, incumbent Everett Roy will face challenger Billy Lerma and in District 4, Kaylynn Paxson will face May Nardone Mendoza.

The runoff election is scheduled for Saturday, Dec. 14. Early voting will run from Dec. 2 through Dec. 10, with voting locations for early and Election Day voting to be announced later.

The two Del Mar faculty in the city races, Jim Klein in the at-large council race and assistant Professor of Sociology and coordinator of the Mexican American Studies Program Isabel Araiza in the mayoral race, lost their bids for election. Klein was the fourth highest vote-getter in his race with 23,247 votes and Ariaza the third highest vote-getter in her race with 11,015 votes.