With early voting beginning next week, we have received several questions about why voters are headed back to the polls so soon after the May 6th election.

The reason has to do with a provision in the Amarillo City Charter that requires candidates to receive a majority of votes to be elected to city office.

On May 6th, Cole Stanley was elected as Mayor of Amarillo with 75% of the vote, Don Tipps was elected to City Council Place 2 with 84% of the vote, and Tom Scherlen was elected to City Council Place 3 with 58% of the vote. While each of these candidates earned a majority of votes, no candidate running for either Place 1 or Place 4 won more than 50%.

According to the Amarillo City Charter, if no candidate receives a majority of votes, “the Council shall immediately order a special election,” where “the names only of the two candidates receiving the highest number of votes at the regular election” will be included on the ballot.

In the Place 1 election, Josh Craft received 43% of the vote, while Dean Crump came in second with 33%. In the Place 4 election, Les Simpson received 45% of the vote, while Claudette Smith came in second with 24% of the vote. Both races featured multiple other candidates who will not advance to the runoff.

Early voting in the runoff begins on Monday, June 12th, and runs through Friday, June 16th, with an additional opportunity to cast an early voting ballot on Tuesday, June 20th. Election Day is Saturday, June 24th.

Voters will have fewer polling places to cast their ballot. Voters in Potter County will be able to cast early vote ballots at the Santa Fe Building, Casey Carpet One, Cornerstone Outreach, or the Northwest Branch Amarillo Public Library. These locations will also be open on election day, in addition to Kids, Inc., Pride Home Center, and the Tri-State Fairgrounds.

Voters in Randall County will only have the Randall County Annex and Comanche Trail Church of Christ for early voting. Both locations will also be open on election day, joined by Oasis Southwest Baptist Church, Southwest Church of Christ, the Texas Panhandle War Memorial Center, and Southwest Branch Library.

To learn more about the runoff candidates, view their responses to our voter guide at AmarilloVotes.online. We will have results live on our website on election night.

There were other local elections on the May 6th ballot where candidates who did not receive a majority of votes still won. Notably, Laurie Gilliland and Casey Posey each won their races for Canyon ISD Board, despite having only won 43% and 38%, respectively. Canyon ISD, however, does not require that a candidate receive a majority of votes. Instead, a candidate simply has to get more votes than any other candidate.