One year after Pulaski County’s leadership was up for grabs, county residents showed little interest in filing for office in next year’s elections. The number of candidates seeking to get their names on the ballot for 2016 was the lowest in at least two decades.
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An analysis of county candidate filings dating back to 1990 shows no years in which fewer than 32 candidates filed for office.
This fall, only 26 candidates filed for the county’s 22 partisan offices.
The 2016 candidate filing period ended last week, four months earlier than usual. Every incumbent filed for re-election. Only four of them drew challengers.
In 2014, three races were contested in the primary election that May. Nine races were contested in the November general election — for the positions of county judge and eight of the 15 justice of the peace seats.
In 2016, only one county office will be contested in the primary, and only three will be contested in the general election.
The drop in candidate filings is likely because of the earlier filing period this year, said officials with the Pulaski County Republican and Democratic committees.
Additionally, they said, no incumbents wanted to leave office, and most justice of the peace districts are solidly Democratic or Republican, making challenges of incumbents less likely in the general election.
“There’s personal stuff every candidate goes through when deciding whether to run,” said H.L. Moody, chairman of the county Democratic Committee. The earlier filing period for the 2016 election required candidates to have the necessary yes or no conversations earlier than usual. In many cases, “the answer comes back ‘no.’ Or the time runs out, and they didn’t decide in time, and it doesn’t happen,” he said.
The Arkansas Legislature voted to move up the state’s 2016 primary after Gov. Asa Hutchinson requested it so that the state would have more of an influence in selecting the presidential nominees.
Phil Stowers, a Republican justice of the peace from Maumelle who is unopposed this year for only the second time in seven election cycles, said he believes the earlier filing period contributed to fewer candidates in 2016.
“I think that had a great impact,” said Stowers, who also was a recruitment officer for the county Republican Committee this year. “People are thinking about Thanksgiving right now. People are thinking about Christmas right now. I know of at least one sitting JP who almost forgot to file. I think people’s minds are elsewhere.”
Only 10 months have passed since Democrat Barry Hyde took over for Buddy Villines as Pulaski County’s first new county judge in 24 years.
According to Stowers, challenging Hyde at this point and in a Democratic stronghold such as Pulaski County would make little sense.
“I think what it comes down to for us is, you don’t want to throw good money after bad,” he said.
In 1992, two years after Villines first took office, the Democratic primary had eight contested races, including a challenger for Villines.
No county offices were contested in the Republican primary that year, and in the general election the only candidate challenges were from four write-in candidates. Still, more candidates filed in 1992 than did this year.
Democrats hold all five executive offices, a constable office and 10 justice of the peace seats. Republicans hold one constable position and five justice of the peace offices. The Republicans will face no Democratic challengers next year.
However, Republicans will challenge Democratic incumbents in two justice of the peace races.
Also, Patrick Mulligan, a Libertarian and former two-time Republican candidate for sheriff, is challenging Sheriff Doc Holladay, a Democrat.
And one justice of the peace race will pit two Democrats against each other. Jason Christopher Smedley is challenging incumbent Lillie McMullen of Little Rock in the primary for the District 5 Quorum Court seat.
Elsewhere in the state, county office filings varied.
In Washington County, seven offices will be contested in the primary and seven in the general election, as opposed to three contests in the primary in 2014 and 10 in the general election. In Benton County, seven offices will be contested in the primary and three in the general election, as opposed to five contests in 2014, all in the primary.
In Saline County, three offices will be challenged in the primary and three in the general election. In 2014, there were six primary contests and six general election contests.
Notably, other counties in Arkansas have more constitutional offices than Pulaski County.
In the 1990s, Pulaski County consolidated its circuit and county clerk positions into one, the treasurer and collector positions into one, and the constable offices into two.
Constable offices in Pulaski County, and in many counties, are not paid positions.
Scott Perkins, legislative and communications director for the Association of Arkansas Counties, said Friday that the association had not yet received all of the state’s county clerks’ lists of candidate filings.
He said once those lists are all compiled, the association can analyze them and compare them with previous years’ filings.