How to run for local office in Kansas: the 2027 guide

The short answer

2027 is Kansas's year for local elections. Cities elect their mayors and council members, school districts elect board of education members, and community colleges elect trustees. To get on the ballot, a candidate files with the county election officer, or with the city clerk for some city council seats, by noon on Tuesday, June 1, 2027. Each candidate chooses one of two routes: a declaration of intention with a $20 filing fee, or a petition signed by voters instead of the fee.

A primary is held on Tuesday, August 3, 2027, but only in races where more than three candidates file for a seat. Every other race goes straight to the general election on Tuesday, November 2, 2027. County and township offices are not on the 2027 ballot, because Kansas elects them in even-numbered years.

This guide walks through each step in order, using the Kansas Statutes (cited as K.S.A.), the 2026 Session Laws of Kansas and the Secretary of State's election standards, forms and guides. The Secretary of State has not yet posted a 2027 calendar, so computed dates are marked "based on state law." This is not legal advice; confirm anything specific to your office with your county election officer. If you have never run for anything before, our post on how to run for local office with no experience covers the groundwork that applies in any state.

What is on Kansas's 2027 ballot, and what is not.

State law sets the first Tuesday in August of odd-numbered years for municipal primaries and the Tuesday after the first Monday in November for the general election (K.S.A. 25-21a01). In 2027, those dates are August 3 and November 2. The law defines "municipality" broadly, so the 2027 ballot can include:

• Cities: mayors and city council or commission members, depending on the city's form of government. Our guides on running for city council in Kansas and running for mayor in Kansas cover these offices.
• School districts: members of the board of education. A unified school district board has seven members serving four-year terms (K.S.A. 72-1072). See how to run for school board in Kansas.
• Community colleges: members of the board of trustees, who serve four-year terms (K.S.A. 71-1412). See how to run for community college trustee in Kansas.
• Some special districts: boards of public utilities and certain drainage, irrigation, extension, improvement, water and hospital districts also follow the municipal schedule. Ask your county election officer whether a district near you has seats on the 2027 ballot.

County and township offices are not on the ballot. Kansas elects county and township officers at partisan elections in even-numbered years, so none of them is up in 2027.

Some cities follow a different schedule. State law lets cities hold elections in even-numbered years to stagger terms or create three-year terms (K.S.A. 25-21a01(h)), and some cities have set other schedules by charter ordinance.

Party labels. School board and community college elections are nonpartisan. City elections are usually nonpartisan as well, but each city's governing body decides (K.S.A. 25-2113). Your city clerk can tell you which applies.

Key 2027 dates at a glance.

The voter dates follow the pattern of the Secretary of State's 2026 calendar. Check them again with your county election officer in the spring. Our Kansas 2027 local election calendar lists every date in order.

Step 1

Check that you qualify.

The county election officer checks each city and school board filing within three days, and that check can include whether you have the qualifications for the office. Settle these questions before you file.

Know who your county election officer is. It is the county clerk, except in counties with more than 125,000 people, which have an election commissioner appointed by the Secretary of State (K.S.A. 19-3419; K.S.A. 25-2504).

School board. A candidate must be an elector who lives in the member district for the seat, or anywhere in the school district for an at-large seat (K.S.A. 25-2020). Under a 2026 change to state law, a school board candidate must remain a qualified elector living in that district through the election and the whole term. Moving out creates an immediate vacancy in the candidacy or the office.

Community college trustee. The same 2026 rule applies: a trustee candidate must live in the member or at-large district and remain a qualified elector there (K.S.A. 71-1414). In addition, no employee of the community college may serve on its board of trustees (K.S.A. 71-1403).

City offices. According to the Secretary of State's election standards, most first class cities have used their home rule power to set their own candidate qualifications, and second and third class cities may change the statutory qualifications by charter ordinance. Ask your city clerk what qualifications apply to the office you want.

Be registered at your current address. If you have moved recently, update your voter registration through the Secretary of State's website or your county election office.

Step 2

Choose the $20 fee or a petition.

Kansas gives every city, school board and community college candidate a choice. The fee is simpler. The petition costs nothing but takes time.

The $20 fee

Any person who meets the qualifications for the office may become a candidate by filing a declaration of intention with the county election officer, accompanied by a filing fee of $20 (K.S.A. 25-21a01(f)). The school board and community college statutes also set $20 (K.S.A. 25-2020; 71-1414). An older city statute still prints different amounts for some council districts, so confirm the fee with your county election officer, who also supplies the declaration form.

The petition

A petition replaces the fee. It must carry signatures of registered voters who live in the district you want to represent. The number depends on the office:

Sources: K.S.A. 25-2020; 71-1414; 25-2110a; 25-2110(b). Ask your county election officer for the exact number for your seat. The Secretary of State recommends collecting more than the number required, because not every signature will be found valid.

Use the right form. City and school candidates use Form CP, the Kansas Non-Partisan City/School Nomination Petition, available from the county election office or the Secretary of State. You fill in the top section first: your name and address, the office, whether it is a regular or unexpired term, and the city or school district. Each signer then gives a signature, printed name, street address, city and the date. You may photocopy the blank form.

Follow the circulator rules. A circulator is the person who carries the petition and collects the signatures. Candidates may circulate their own petitions. Each circulator must be a U.S. citizen, at least 18, and not convicted of a felony unless pardoned or with civil rights restored (K.S.A. 25-3608). The circulator must personally witness every signature, keep each page to signers from a single county, and sign a notarized affidavit on the back of the form. A circulator may not sign the front of a petition they are carrying.

Plan on paper, with every signature witnessed. No Kansas statute provides for electronic signatures on a candidate petition, and the circulator's affidavit states that they watched each person sign.

Watch the 180-day rule. A petition is void unless it is filed within 180 days of the date of its first signature (K.S.A. 25-3602(d)), and the Secretary of State's candidate petition guide applies this rule to nonpartisan local candidates. For a petition filed at noon on June 1, 2027, the first signature should be dated no earlier than Thursday, December 3, 2026 (based on state law). Ask your county election officer if you are unsure how the rule applies to your petition.

File everything at once. All pages must be filed together, and a petition that falls short cannot be topped up later; circulation must start again. A signer may also withdraw their name by written notice up to the third day after you file (K.S.A. 25-3602(c)).

Step 3

File by noon on Tuesday, June 1, 2027.

The statutes for city, school board and community college candidates set a deadline but no opening date: noon on June 1 of the election year (K.S.A. 25-2109; K.S.A. 71-1414). Ask your county election officer when the office begins accepting 2027 filings, and file well before the last morning, so there is time to fix a problem.

Where to file:

• School board candidates file with the county election officer. The declaration or petition must name the member position, and a filing for an unexpired term must say so.
• Community college candidates file with the election officer for the trustee election. That election is conducted by the county election officer of the county where the college's main campus is located (K.S.A. 71-1413), so ask that office where to file.
• City candidates for an at-large office, such as mayor where the voters elect the mayor citywide, file with the county election officer of the county that holds most of the city's population (K.S.A. 25-2110).
• City candidates for a district seat file with the city clerk in first and second class cities. The clerk forwards the filing to the county election officer within three business days. In third class cities, district candidates may file with the county election officer or the city clerk (K.S.A. 25-2110a).

After you file. For city and school board candidates, the county election officer decides within three days whether a filing is valid. If it is found invalid, you will be told why and may object. Objections to local filings are decided by a county objections board, and the deadlines are short, so ask your county election officer for them and keep copies of everything you file.

Withdrawals. After the filing deadline, a candidate may withdraw only under two exceptions added in 2026: a severe medical hardship on the candidate or their immediate family, certified by a physician, or no longer living in the district. A certification received by September 1 of the election year keeps the name off the ballot. If you are having second thoughts, decide before noon on June 1.

Step 4

Find out whether your race has a primary.

A Kansas local race has a primary only when many candidates file for the same seat or seats. The rules are the same for cities, school boards and community colleges (K.S.A. 25-2108a; 25-2021; 71-1415):

• District or member seats: a primary is held only if more than three qualified candidates file for the seat. The top two advance to November.
• At-large races: a primary is held only if more than three times as many candidates file as there are seats. Twice as many candidates as there are seats advance.
• Unexpired terms are listed separately, with their own primary if more than three candidates file.

You will know whether your race has a primary soon after the June 1 deadline. Primary ballots have no write-in lines. General election ballots carry write-in lines for each office, equal to the number of seats.

Step 5

Plan the campaign around the voter dates.

If your race has a primary, you have about nine weeks between the filing deadline and August 3. If it does not, you have five months until November 2. Either way, the same voter dates shape the final weeks:

• Registration deadline: Tuesday, July 13 for the primary and Tuesday, October 12 for the general election (based on state law). Encourage supporters who have moved to update their registration before then.
• Advance voting: mail ballots go out and counties may open in-person advance voting on Wednesday, July 14 and Wednesday, October 13. Every county must offer in-person advance voting from Tuesday, July 27 and Tuesday, October 26, until noon on the day before the election (based on state law). Check your county's sites and hours.
• Mail ballots must reach the county election office by 7 p.m. on election day (K.S.A. 25-1132).

If your campaign plans to mail voters an application for an advance ballot, Kansas has specific rules about the form and how the mailing is labeled (K.S.A. 25-1122(k)). Read them, or ask your county election officer, before you start.

Many local campaigns are built on conversations at the door. A simple approach is to divide your district into areas, knock on each area once before advance voting opens, and return to households that were undecided. If volunteers help, Beacon, a door-to-door canvassing app, lets you draw turf (the area each volunteer covers) on a map, assign it, give canvassers walk lists ordered by distance, and record a result at each door, such as contacted, not home or come back later.

Our campaign plan to the August 3, 2027 Kansas primary turns these dates into a week-by-week schedule, with a path for races that go straight to November.

Step 6

Text the supporters who asked to hear from you.

Text messages help you reach supporters at the moments that matter: when advance voting opens, before an event, and in the last days of the campaign. Set texting up in this order with CampaignCNX+.

1. Form your committee and get an EIN. Campaign Verify is the check that confirms to the carriers (the mobile phone companies) that a political sender is a real campaign. It is open to 527 committees (527 is the federal tax status of a political committee) that have an EIN (the committee's federal tax ID number) and a filing with an election authority that is published online. Candidates with no committee, and sole proprietors, are not eligible. Questions about forming or running the committee go to your county election officer or the Kansas Governmental Ethics Commission.
2. Check that your filing is viewable online. Before you request Campaign Verify, ask your county election officer whether your committee's filing is posted online, and where. If you cannot find it, contact Campaign Verify Support before you pay. Campaign Verify decides eligibility, and we cannot promise it.
3. Request at the right time. Campaign Verify costs $95 per two-year cycle, and the PIN goes only to the contact details on your filing. A request made before Sunday, November 15, 2026 expires on Sunday, January 31, 2027, long before the June filing deadline. A request made on or after November 15, 2026 lasts until Wednesday, January 31, 2029, which covers the August 3 primary and the November 2 election.
4. Open your account and let CampaignCNX+ file your registration. CampaignCNX+ files your carrier registration for you, either 10DLC (the registration for texting from a standard local-style number, a one-time $75 for your first local line) or toll-free. For a toll-free number, the carrier review usually takes about three business days. You buy the $95 Campaign Verify token from Campaign Verify, and CampaignCNX+ files it with your registration.
5. Add only people who gave written permission. Text supporters who gave prior express written consent, for example on a sign-up sheet that plainly says they agree to receive campaign texts, with the date recorded. Record the consent date and source in a custom field, tag where you met each person, and put supporters in a group. Never text everyone who signed your petition or everyone on a voter list.
6. Write short messages and schedule them. Keep each text under 160 characters, name the campaign, and end the first message with "Reply STOP to opt out." STOP, HELP and START replies are handled automatically. Texts send only between 8 a.m. and 9 p.m. in the recipient's time zone, so schedule advance voting and election day reminders inside those hours.

100 free SMS included. Your number is $5 a month, and the free texts can be used once your number is bought and approved. After that, pay-as-you-go texting costs $0.06 per SMS segment, and the Basic plan is $55 a month for 1,000 texts. For the full setup, read texting voters in a Kansas local race. Our post on Campaign Verify for local candidates explains verification in more depth, and our Midwest campaign texting page covers texting across the region.

Guides for each part of the race.

• Kansas 2027 local election calendar for candidates
• How to run for city council in Kansas
• How to run for mayor in Kansas
• How to run for school board in Kansas
• How to run for community college trustee in Kansas
• A campaign plan to the August 3, 2027 Kansas primary
• Texting voters in a Kansas local race: consent and setup