Los Angeles held a non-partisan mayoral election on March 5, 2013. Eight candidates were on the ballot. No one got as much as 50%, so there is a run-off on May 21. Dante Atkins has this article about the race at Calitics. The run-off is between Eric Garcetti, a current city councilmember, and Wendy Grueuel, the city controller. Probably most observers agree that the biggest issue in the election is what to do about city employee pensions.

Garcetti describes how Grueuel originally took a position on city pensions that was more favorable to city workers than the position of Garcetti. Therefore, the union that represents city workers endorsed Grueuel. Now, however, Grueuel has changed her position on the pension issue, for what appear to be opportunistic reasons. This tendency for candidates to reverse themselves on key issues is not solely a characteristic of non-partisan elections. It happens in partisan elections as well. Nevertheless, in a partisan election, a candidate is somewhat constrained to follow his or her own party’s platform. In the absence parties, there are no party platforms with any relevance in the race, and the opportunities for candidates to appear to have absolutely no fixed stands on issues are greater.

Another characteristic of this year’s Los Angeles election is the low turnout. At the March 5 election, only 292,760 ballots were cast, even though at the time Los Angeles had 1,817,107 registered voters. Partisanship, for all its flaws, does tend to stimulate better turnout. Most observers believe the May 21 run-off turnout will be equally bad.

On March 23, the Chicago Tribune carried this comprehensive investigative report on Illinois ballot access procedures, especially for local office.

On March 25, Monday, a 3-judge U.S. District Court will hold a trial in Harris v Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission, 2:12cv894. The issue is whether the state’s U.S. House districts are equal enough in population to be constitutional. See this story.

Another case pending against the Arizona U.S. House districts is moving much more slowly. That case, Arizona State Legislature v Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission, 2:12cv1211, concerns whether having an independent redistricting commission draw U.S. House districts is unconstitutional. The legislature argues that the U.S. Constitution, Article One, provides that only legislatures, and not independent redistricting commissions, can draw U.S. House districts. That case is still bogged down over the issue of whether 3 judges are needed, or just a single judge.