Pacitalian regional and communal elections, 2024
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1,033 regional deputies 16,748 regional administrators 74,872 communal mayors and councillors | ||||||||||
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The 2024 regional and communal elections in Pacitalia will be held on November 25th, 2024. Pacitalian voters will elect a total of 1,033 deputies to the country's 22 regional parliamentary bodies, which govern their respective autonomous communities. Voters simultaneously elect mayors, councillors, and directors to more than 91,000 open public offices nationwide.
Background
Subnational elections in Pacitalia are triennial and held on the last Monday of November in the year following a scheduled national parliamentary election. As Pacitalia is a unitary state, the national government has the power to suspend regional elections, or to hold a national-level referendum on the same day. Otherwise, national and subnational election dates are decoupled. If a snap election is held at the national level before it is legally required, no corresponding election is mandated at the regional level. For example, the last parliamentary election was held in 2023, meaning the next one is scheduled for the end of November, 2026. If a parliamentary election were called in the spring of 2025, before the end of the term, it would not automatically result in a regional election the following spring.
Regional parliaments also have the power to dissolve themselves early, for reasons such as political gridlock, and can hold a special election, to which any elected deputies serve only the remainder of the existing three-year term.
Pacitalia uses simple proportional representation to elect deputies to regional parliaments, unlike at the national level, where that method elects some lawmakers but the rest, coming from geographic districts, are chosen through instant-runoff voting. Mayors are elected using simple plurality voting, with the exception of Timiocato and Nortopalazzo, which use instant-runoff voting. Councillors are elected using at-large voting, electing the top x number of candidates from a broad list. Municipalities are not allowed to use a ward system.
Candidates for regional and communal offices can, and usually do, run under a party banner. Conversely, so-called regional administrators, who are responsible for overseeing things like local land and water management, and the administration of some public services like parks and green spaces, sewage, or waste disposal, must be non-partisan.
Once regional and communal officeholders are elected, parties most often enter into localized coalition agreements to ensure a working majority on their respective councils for the entirety of the term. The media typically define projections of so-called "overall control" on councils within the context of traditional left-right politics.
The number of regional deputies increased in this election, from 914 to 1,033, following on a PSDC campaign promise in the previous parliamentary election to strengthen regional governance and representation.