Richmond, California voters elected a member of the Green Party to be Mayor, on November 7. Unlike many cities in California, the voters directly choose their Mayor by a direct election (the more normal California pattern is for the city council to choose one of its own to be Mayor). The election, like all city and county elections in California, is non-partisan. However, the winning Green is well-known for being a member of the Green Party. She has been on the city council since 2002. She is Gayle McLaughlin, who won a 3-person race with 37.2% of the vote. The defeated incumbent, Irma Anderson, polled 36.1%, and a third candidate, Gary Bell, received 26.1%. The remaining .6% was cast for write-in candidates.

Professor Michael McDonald has estimated turnout at 39.7% at the election this week. This means 39.7% of the potential electorate voted (including registered voters as well as those who could have registered).

On November 7, California voters rejected an initiative that would have imposed discrimination against small qualified parties into the election law. The “Clean Elections” initiative, unlike similar initatives that passed years ago in Maine, Massachusetts and Arizona, would have provided that Democratic and Republican nominees automatically get substantially more public funding than anyone else. This, despite the fact that all candidates seeking public funding would have been subject to the same burden of getting a specified number of voters to give them $5 contributions. The initiative lost 74%-26%.