An unusual election could produce some unusual outcomes
by Matt Poust | Contributing Writer
As the 2025 City of Folly Beach Mayoral and Council campaigns near their Tuesday, Nov. 4 finish lines, the two races have reached the momentary lull state that exists between the noise of a candidate campaign scramble and the tallying of votes on election night. Early voting has commenced, organized forums and special events have wrapped, and the final candidate campaign efforts are found in ads in this publication, on yard signs, on mailers in P.O. Boxes, and social media posts, hoping to snag any remaining undecided votes left on the island.
Before Election Day, it’s necessary to acknowledge the varying election outcomes that loom large in a general election with 11 total candidates jockeying for four open seats — five in the mayoral race and six running for the three council seats.
In an effort to simplify some of the complexities of these outcomes, the first barrier comes in understanding how Folly’s mayoral and council winners will be determined.
As per Charleston County’s Board of Voter Registration & Elections, the City of Folly Beach is classified as a “majority” election and uses a specialized formula to determine election results and the procedure for runoff elections.
This is pretty easy for the mayoral election since it’s one seat and each voter chooses one candidate. Therefore, the winner would need to get a simple majority to clinch (50 percent plus one vote). But since there are five candidates, it’s quite possible that this threshold will not be met. This would force a runoff between the top two candidates.
Now in the case of City Council, it gets a great deal more complicated. Since there are three seats open, each individual voter will have the chance to vote for up to three candidates. The formula used to determine a “majority” takes the total number of votes cast (not voters), divides that number of open seats (three), then divide that by two, in order to figure out what number would give a majority.
Clear as mud? Good.
If you really want to break your brain, you could just look up South Carolina Code of Laws Title 5 – Municipal Corporations Chapter 15 – Nominations And Elections For Municipal Offices Section 5-15-62 (Determination of election results under nonpartisan election and runoff election method). However, we tried to spare you this and provide some clarity on this issue, taking this formula into account. These are three plausible scenarios that could play out for both the mayoral and council races following the final Nov. 4 results.
Scenario one — Outright Victories
Scenario one would come into effect if one mayoral candidate meets the majority vote threshold, leaving a clean-cut general election with no runoff election needed. In the instance of City Council, if there are more than three council candidates meeting the majority mark (based on the aforementioned formula), the three with the highest total number of votes claim the seats.
Scenario two — Runoff Roadmaps
The playout of a runoff election can be divided into multiple levels, with the initial coming into play if no mayoral candidate receives the majority general election vote. In this scenario, the top two mayoral vote getters would be in a runoff, which would be held on Tuesday, Nov. 18.
For City Council, if fewer than three council candidates achieve the majority threshold, this would constitute a runoff between one more than the total number of candidates needed to fill the vacant seats. If two council candidates win a majority in the general election, the two with the next highest number of votes will be pulled into the runoff on Tuesday, Nov. 18.
One council candidate achieving a majority would pull three candidates in, and zero majority winners would pull four candidates into a runoff with winners determined by those who receive the most votes, regardless of whether it meets the majority mark or not.
Scenario three — What if Houghton or Bizzell clinch?
With time left on their council seat terms, a mayoral election of either Katherine Houghton or Chris Bizzell would open a fourth vacant seat on council, leading to a special election which would be held in February. Any candidate elected through this special election would serve the remainder of Houghton or Bizzell’s term rather than getting a fresh four-year term. Members of the Folly City Administration noted that an election such as this would wipe the candidate slate clean and require registration or re-registration from anyone looking to run.
Any loose-end inquiries on when to vote, where to vote, and what to bring to vote can be tied up by visiting the Board of Voter Registration and Elections page at
www.charlestoncounty.gov.
