Candidates battling in nine competitive races for Denver City Council — or at least to make the cut for a runoff — will make final appeals to voters Tuesday.
Polls will close at 7 p.m. Voters in two dozen secure 24-hour drop boxes across the city or to vote in person at seven Voter Service and Polling Centers. It’s too late to mail a ballot and have it count.
The voter centers were set to close at 6 p.m. Monday and reopen at 7 a.m. Tuesday. Go to to find locations of centers and drop boxes.
Without a hyper-competitive mayor’s race this year, the major focus has been on the highest number of open or competitive council races in more than a decade. Forty-two candidates . Six district races lack incumbents, mostly due to term limits.
In the at-large race, the top two of five candidates will win without further action. In all others, winners need to notch more than 50 percent support to avoid a two-way runoff.
Four races — in Districts 2, 7, 10 and 11 — have at least five candidates (District 7 has nine), making June 2 runoffs likely.
Though citywide turnout stood at just shy of 18 percent as of Saturday — with 62,390 ballots cast — the Denver Elections Division said the pace has been ahead of the run-up to the hotly contested mayoral election in 2011, owing to interest in council races.
Turnout generally is low in municipal elections, but officials expect a last-minute surge Tuesday.
“That’s how Denver people vote,” Denver Elections spokesman Alton Dillard said. “It varies by election, but once it gets to be Election Day, the light bulb goes on for a lot of people.”
Mayor Michael Hancock faces , but none has reported raising any money. They are Sekú (short for Chairman Sekú, an alias for community activist Stephan E. Evans), Paul Noël Fiorino and Marcus Giavanni.
For the open city auditor’s office, . Clerk and Recorder Debra Johnson .
To read all The Denver Post election coverage and view questionnaire responses from all council candidates, .
