JACKSONVILLE, Onslow County \u2014 A new bill in the North Carolina General Assembly could significantly change how Jacksonville elects its City Council members.<\/p>\n
Legislation filed this month by Republican Reps. Wyatt Gable and Phil Shepard would require all six members of the Jacksonville City Council to be elected at-large. Under the proposal, every voter in the city would cast ballots for every council seat.<\/p>\n
Jacksonville\u2019s current system is split: four council members are elected by district, representing specific wards, while two are elected citywide. The bill would eliminate district-based seats entirely, shifting to a fully at-large system.<\/p>\n
Supporters say the change could create a more unified council, with members accountable to the entire city rather than individual neighborhoods.<\/p>\n
Critics argue removing ward representation could limit the voices of specific communities, particularly smaller or minority populations that rely on district-based seats for representation.<\/p>\n
Opposition to the proposal is already organizing. A Jacksonville resident, Al Burgess, has started a petition urging lawmakers not to approve the change. The petition, hosted on Change.org, is gaining traction among residents.<\/p>\n
If approved into law, the change would take effect beginning with the 2027 municipal elections.<\/p>\n
Council members would continue serving staggered four-year terms, and the mayor would still be elected citywide.<\/p>\n
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House Bill 1038 is currently under consideration in the Committee on Election Law.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Onslow County \u2014 A new bill in the North Carolina General Assembly could significantly change how Jacksonville…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":760538,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5136],"tags":[5229,3188,723,7310,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-760537","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-fl","10":"tag-florida","11":"tag-jacksonville","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-united-states-of-america","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","16":"tag-us","17":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116486147295195635","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/760537","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=760537"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/760537\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/760538"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=760537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=760537"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=760537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}