Nashvillians head to the polls Thursday to elect a new mayor and four at-large council seats, while some voters will also elect a new council member for their district.
A total of 68,319 voters cast their ballot early for the runoff, over 11,000 more than those who early voted in the August general election.
Sixteen candidates are running in five local races while three are vying for a Tennessee House seat.
Follow along for updates throughout the day.
Live results after polls close at 7 p.m. can be found here.
Nashville election results:See runoff totals in race for mayor
Voting turnout up at 5 p.m. reporting
Election administrator Jeff Roberts confirmed a larger turnout for Thursday’s runoff election during the commission’s 5 p.m. reporting numbers compared to last month’s general election.
Collecting votes from one precinct each at 5 p.m., Roberts said there were 11,443 ballots cast Thursday, compared to last month’s general election when 10,718 votes were counted.
Paper voting begins at Pear-Cohn
Voters casting ballots at Pearl-Cohn High School, 904 26th Ave. N., are voting by paper ballot after fire alarms sounded after 5 p.m., election administrator Jeff Roberts said.
Roberts said machines remain in the school, but voting continues outside per emergency protocol.
Voters would return before 6 p.m. Roberts said.
The cause of the alarm remains unknown.
Teacher casts her ballot
Mary Jane Manley has lived in Nashville her whole life. She’s seen a lot of change in her 31 years, but said that “in general, I feel about good my city.”Manley is a public educator and said that drove much of who she voted for Thursday afternoon at Tusculum Elementary.“Being in public education it’s very important to me that that’s funded and that we are supported, and that my families are supported,” she said.Manley said residents can’t expect a change unless they participate in local elections.“The local government is where it all starts,” she said.
Go deeper:See who has endorsed Freddie O’Connell and Alice Rolli
Voting at Tusculum Elementary School was “super easy,” Manley said, adding that poll workers were helpful explaining the process.
Power restored after outage causes two polling locations to use battery-backup
A power outage in Bellevue was impacting about 600 customers, including the Bellevue Library and Bellevue Middle School where two polling locations are set up.
The two locations were using battery power to keep the polls open, Jeff Roberts, administrator for Davidson County Election Commission, said.
Power was restored shortly after 1 p.m.
Slow morning at the polls
Two hours after polls opened in Nashville, turnout remained low.
“It’s been very, very slow,” a poll worker said at the downtown Nashville Public Library. Only 23 people had voted there by 9 a.m.
Kayley Goodhue, 25, and Kaitlyn Tokarz, 25, were voters number 24 and 25.
“I’m a member of the LGTBQ community, so it was important to me we have that representation on the council,” Tokarz said when explaining her picks for at-large cadidates.
Both are recent transplants to Nashville who said they see themselves spending several years here.
“I wanted to make sure we have people who, as Nashville grows and expands, wants to keep up with it and not just curate towards tourism,” Goodhue said. “Finding people who care about people who live here and wanting to make it better for us is a big deal.”
Polls open in Nashville
Polls opened promptly at 7 a.m. across Nashville as a sunny, but chilly morning met early voters.A few people waited in their cars before lining up outside Shelby Park Community Center in East Nashville to cast their ballots.Supporters campaigning for various candidates stayed well past the 100-foot boundary and greeted voters warmly with coffee in hand.Meanwhile, life moved on around the center as people walked their dogs and others played pickle ball on the courts.
Who is in a runoff for Nashville mayor?
Nashville will have a new mayor by the end of the day.
The runoff features Freddie O’Connell, who is leaving Metro Council to run for mayor, and Alice Rolli, whose career spans business, education, and state and federal government service.
Who is in a runoff for a district Metro Council seat?
Three district Council seats are in a runoff — Districts 4, 11 and 29.
District 4 candidates include:
- Davette Blalock, a former two-term council member who is allowed to run for a rare third term because she left office representing District 27 before her home was rezoned in 2019.
- Mike Cortese, a Belmont University professor who previously made a bid for the District 4 seat, losing to Robert Swope in 2019.
District 11 candidates include:
- Jeff Eslick, a self-described conservative who runs Slick Media Productions and ran a campaign on expanding the police force, managing growth, and fixing the “growing problem with encampments” in Nashville.
- Eric Patton, a self-described Democrat who works as a customer relations director ran a campaign on improving schools and city services, and ensuring a fair “piece of the pie” for District 11.
District 29 candidates include:
- Tasha Ellis, a political consultant who ran a campaign on public safety, alleviating traffic and concerns about how growth impacts the city.
- John Reed, a political consultant who ran a campaign on increasing access to affordable housing, and improving transit and connectivity for the district.
Who is in the Metro Council at-large runoff?
Several seats remain up for grabs after at-large incumbent Zulfat Suara was the only one to secure enough votes for her seat during the Aug. 3 general election.
Eight candidates are vying for half the number of seats.
The following candidates will be on the runoff ballot:
- Burkley Allen, an incumbent who has been an at-large Metro Council member since 2019 and served District 18 from 2011 to 2019.
- Chris Cheng, owner of Hot Sauce Nashville and a U.S. Army Ranger veteran.
- Quin Evans-Segall, attorney and vice chair of the Metro Nashville Davidson County Industrial Development Board.
- Olivia Hill, retired from a 26-year career at Vanderbilt University power plant.
- Howard Jones, pastor and educational administrator at Metro NAshville Public Schools.
- Delishia Porterfield, represented District 29 on the Metro Council since 2019.
- Russ Pulley, term-limited District 25 Metro Council member.
- Jeff Syracuse, term-limited District 15 Metro Council member.
Who is running in the Tennessee House District 51 seat?
Three candidates are running for the House District 51 seat, initially left vacant after the unexpected death of Rep. Bill Beck, D-Nashville.
Metro Council appointed former Council member Anthony Davis in June to temporarily serve in the seat, but he lost in the Democratic primary.
Cadidates running for the seat include:
Where do I vote?
The city has an online tool to help you find your polling location with your address.
Voters can find that information here, as well as hours and the date of the next election.
