After Record Turnout, What’s Next for New York?
Map of City election results in 2025; copyrighted New York Times.
Among the cities in America, it has often seemed paradoxical that civic engagement in New York is so low. While Los Angeles and Chicago have often seen turnout rates around 40%, New York has lagged behind — in 2021, turnout was at around 23%, the lowest point in modern municipal history. In fact, turnout for city mayoral elections has gone consistently downhill since the 2000s, a trend that underscores a growing threat of disengagement that could perhaps shake the foundations of our political system. But 2025 seemed to prove different — turnout this year was at 2 million (39.91%), a figure not seen since the mid-20th century, when turnout rates could often be over 80%. But will this set a precedent for future elections, or will the city lose its energy once again?
The problem goes beyond mayoral elections. Realistically, not many New Yorkers are able to name their city council member, and it is less likely that they can list some of the work they carry out. Indeed, apathy to local civics has grown to be so large that you simply can’t blame the people for being unaware — the crisis seems to be much more systemic. One cannot also say that city institutions have become irrelevant to modern politics — City Hall is still responsible for the over hundred-billion dollar city budget every year, and the office of mayor is intuitively central to people’s political lives. We must therefore go beyond these particulars and tackle a greater issue: the crisis of local politics in this city.
There are two main points to address when it comes to how local elections are overlooked in this city. First and foremost, the simple fact is that most New Yorkers don’t really recognize what local bodies do. This is not their fault, but has so many factors involved that it’s impossible to pin the blame on one or two sources. The media already has to overlook important events on the national scale — why spend a few minutes on the trivialities of city hall? And the council itself has not done a phenomenal job at promoting itself, its members, or the work it does — people for the most part tend to see policies for what they are and do, instead of looking at where or who they’re coming from. Another significant issue is the lack of political diversity, which seems to lend itself towards a civic fatigue after primaries are decided by a relatively small pool of voters. Is that apathy unwarranted? Where does indifference end and intentional ignorance begin?
What measures are being taken to prevent these issues? Certainly the most recent mayoral election is bringing these issues to the center — 2.3 million people tuned into television networks during the last debate, and over 2 million voted on Election Day. No matter which candidate one supported, if any, one cannot reject the national intrigue placed on the mayoral race. There is no doubt that local issues are starting to effervesce as politically relevant in our public discourse, across demographics and age groups — the only question, then, is if current trends will continue into the future. Some city organizations have tried to make this change everlasting, petitioning the city Campaign Finance Board to move municipal elections to synchronize with federal elections; a referendum based on this idea was accordingly placed on the ballot for Election Day. Some have said this measure would “increase representation among those who vote” — if one is showing up to vote for the president, why not put in a ballot for other local offices? Opponents of the proposal say this policy would drown out the importance of local elections with the typical media storm that follows the presidential campaign trail. By November 4th, this proposal was rejected by the city in slim margins.
On November 4th, New Yorkers went to the polls. They voted for a variety of official positions --- including but not limited to the mayor, city council members, city comptroller, and municipal judges --- and important ballot measures that the constituency itself had been chosen to adjudicate. All these roles play a key role in making this city work, making engagement all the more important. It is not simply a matter of voting, but extends to simple awareness of local institutions and offices in this city, and attention to local news. Whether interest is fleeting is a question only the future can answer.
