How to run for local office in Texas: the 2027 city and school board guide

The short answer

Many Texas cities and school districts hold their regular elections on Saturday, May 1, 2027, the spring uniform election date. Voters choose mayors, city council members (called aldermen or commissioners in some general-law cities) and school board trustees. To get on the ballot, you file one sworn document, an application for a place on the ballot, between Wednesday, January 13, 2027 and 5 p.m. on Friday, February 12, 2027. City candidates file with the city secretary, and school board candidates file with the secretary of the school board or the person the board designates.

These races are nonpartisan by default. Under state law, a city or school candidate's name appears on the ballot only as an independent, so there is no party primary to win first, although a home-rule city's charter may provide for partisan elections. Most cities and school districts require no filing fee and no petition. Some home-rule cities do, under their charters. Because charters vary, confirm every rule in this guide with your city secretary or school district before you file.

This guide walks through each step in order. The dates come from the Texas Secretary of State's 2027 election dates, and the rules come from the Texas Election Code, Education Code and Local Government Code, with section numbers in the text. A few dates are not yet on an official calendar, so we calculated them from the statutes and marked them "based on state law." This is not legal advice. 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 the May 2027 ballot.

City offices. Texas cities are either home-rule cities, which have their own charter, or general-law cities, which run under state law. The Secretary of State describes the general-law types this way: a Type C city is governed by a mayor and two commissioners, and Type A and Type B cities have a mayor and five aldermen. Your city secretary can tell you which type your city is. Council terms are two years by default. A home-rule charter, or the voters of a general-law city at an election, may set longer terms of up to four years (Texas Constitution, Article XI, Section 11). Seats may be elected citywide by numbered "place," from single-member districts, or a mix.

School board trustees. An independent school district is governed by an elected board of trustees. Trustees serve terms of three or four years, so some seats are on the ballot each year or every other year (Education Code Section 11.059). Depending on the district, trustees are elected at large, by numbered position, or from single-member trustee districts. Trustees serve without pay (Section 11.061).

Other local boards. Water districts, hospital districts and other special districts may also hold elections on the May uniform date. Their rules differ, so this guide covers city and school offices only.

Not every city and district votes in May. State law has allowed many political subdivisions to move their elections to the November uniform date, and a 2025 law lets school districts do the same. A school district's trustee election must be held on the same date as a city election within the district, the November general election, or certain other local elections (Education Code Section 11.0581). If your city or district votes on Tuesday, November 2, 2027, filing runs from Saturday, July 17 to 5 p.m. on Monday, August 16, 2027, according to the Secretary of State, which notes those dates may change after the 2027 legislative session. Ask your city secretary or school district which date applies to your seat.

Key 2027 dates at a glance.

A 2025 law, Senate Bill 2753, will change early voting so that it ends the day before election day, once the Secretary of State publishes the report that puts it into effect. No date has been set for that report, so confirm early voting dates before you share them. Our Texas May 2027 election calendar lists every date in order, with the law behind each one.

Step 1

Check that you qualify.

All candidates for the same office must meet the same requirements. The application you file is a sworn statement that you meet them, so check before you sign.

The general rule. Unless a city charter or another law sets different rules, Election Code Section 141.001 requires a candidate for public office to:

• be a United States citizen;
• be 18 or older on the first day of the term;
• not have been found by a final court judgment to be totally mentally incapacitated, or partially mentally incapacitated without the right to vote;
• not have a final felony conviction, unless pardoned or otherwise released from its resulting disabilities;
• have lived continuously in Texas for 12 months, and in the city, district or ward for six months, immediately before the filing deadline; and
• be registered to vote in the territory by the filing deadline.

With a filing deadline of February 12, 2027, the general rule means living in Texas continuously since at least February 12, 2026 and in the territory since at least August 12, 2026 (based on state law). Your registration must be in effect by the filing deadline, not merely submitted, and the Secretary of State lists Tuesday, January 12, 2027 as the last day for candidates to register or update their registration.

Home-rule cities. A city charter may set its own age and residence requirements, but it cannot require an age above 21 or more than 12 months of residence in the state or city before election day (Section 141.003). If the charter is silent, the general rule applies.

General-law cities. State law adds rules for some offices. A Type A mayor must be a registered voter who has lived in the city for the 12 months before election day (Local Government Code Section 22.032). In a Type B city, the mayor and aldermen must be qualified voters who have lived in the city for the six months before election day (Section 23.024). Our posts on running for city council in Texas and running for mayor in Texas cover each office.

School board trustees. The general rule applies, and the Education Code adds its own rules. A trustee must be a qualified voter (Section 11.061). A person who is required to register as a sex offender is not eligible to serve (Section 11.061), and a person convicted of a felony is ineligible to serve (Section 11.066). In a district with single-member trustee districts, you must live in the trustee district you want to represent (Section 11.052). Our guide to running for school board in Texas covers the details.

One office at a time. You may not file for two offices that cannot be held by the same person when both are voted on at elections held on one date. Every application filed after the first one is invalid (Section 141.033).

Step 2

Find out what your city or district requires.

Texas leaves many details to each city and district, so your next step is to read their notices and ask questions.

Read the filing notice. By Monday, December 14, 2026, the filing authority must post a notice of the filing period. The notice must give an email address where applications may be filed (Section 141.040). Cities and districts that can levy a tax must also post the requirements and deadlines for filing for each office on their websites.

Ask the city secretary or school district office five questions.

1. Which seats are on the May 1, 2027 ballot, and is my seat a numbered place, a single-member district or at large?
2. Which district or ward is my home in?
3. Does the charter or the district require a filing fee or a petition?
4. Is the race decided by the most votes, or does it require a majority, with a runoff if no one gets one?
5. What term will the winner serve?

Filing fees and petitions. The Secretary of State says that most local political subdivisions do not require a filing fee or petitions. A home-rule charter may require a filing fee, and if it does, the charter or an ordinance must also offer an alternative to paying it, such as a petition (Election Code Section 143.005). For any petition filed with a home-rule city application, the minimum number of signatures is 25 or one-half of one percent of the total votes cast for mayor in the territory at the last mayoral election, whichever is greater. A fee or petition must be filed at the same time as the application.

If your city uses petitions, every signer must be a registered voter of the territory, and each line needs the signer's printed name, residence address, date of birth or voter registration number, and the date of signing (Section 141.063). The person collecting signatures must witness each one and swear to an affidavit before a notary or other officer (Sections 141.064 and 141.065). A voter may sign the petition of only one candidate for the same office (Section 141.066). State law sets no petition for school board candidates. Our post on the Texas application for a place on the ballot explains the petition option in more detail.

Step 3

File your application for a place on the ballot.

The Secretary of State's form is Form 2-49, the Application for a Place on the Ballot for a General Election for a City, School District or Other Political Subdivision. A few habits prevent most problems.

• Fill in every required line. The form asks for the office and any place number, your name as it should appear on the ballot, your residence address (not a P.O. box), occupation, date of birth, felony conviction status, and how long you have lived in the state and in the territory. Your voter registration number, phone numbers and public email address are optional.
• Use your ballot name carefully. A nickname is allowed only if you have been commonly known by it for at least three years, and it may not be a slogan, include a title, or indicate a political, economic, social or religious view or affiliation.
• Swear to it before an authorized officer. The application must be signed and sworn to before a notary public or another person authorized to give oaths (Section 141.031). For city offices, the city secretary may administer the oath.
• Choose how to deliver it. You may file in person or by mail, or by fax or email to the address in the filing notice if no filing fee is due. An emailed or faxed application must already be sworn. A mailed application counts only when it is received.
• File early. The filing authority reviews your application within five days (Section 141.032) and notifies you in writing if it is rejected. You may not amend an application after you file it, so an early filing gives you time to deal with a problem before 5 p.m. on February 12.

The full walk-through is in the Texas application for a place on the ballot. Check with the Texas Ethics Commission for any other filings.

After you file. Write-in candidates must file a declaration by 5 p.m. on Tuesday, February 16, 2027 (based on state law), because write-in votes in city and school trustee races count only for declared candidates. You may withdraw until 5 p.m. on Friday, February 19, 2027 (based on state law) by filing a notarized withdrawal. If every candidate on the ballot is unopposed after the deadlines, the governing body declares them elected and the election is not held (Election Code Sections 2.051 to 2.053). And if no one files for a city office with a four-year term, filing for that office stays open until 5 p.m. on Friday, March 5, 2027 (Section 143.008).

Step 4

Plan the campaign around May 1.

A candidate who files on February 12 has eleven weeks until election day. Four voter dates shape that stretch:

• Thursday, April 1, 2027: voter registration ends. Remind supporters who have moved to update their registration.
• Monday, April 19 to Tuesday, April 27, 2027: early voting in person, as listed by the Secretary of State. Confirm the dates, hours and locations with your city, school district or county elections office.
• Tuesday, April 20, 2027: a voter's application for a mail ballot must be received.
• Saturday, May 1, 2027: election day, with polls open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Local races are often won through conversations at the door. A simple approach is to divide your district into areas, knock on each area once before early 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.

Plan for a possible runoff. Where a majority is required and no candidate receives one, the top two candidates meet in a runoff (Election Code Sections 2.021 and 2.023). Cities whose council terms are longer than two years must elect by majority, some charters require it, and a school board may adopt a majority rule by resolution (Education Code Section 11.057). The runoff falls on a Saturday the Secretary of State designates, between Monday, May 31 and Tuesday, June 15, 2027 (based on state law).

Our campaign plan to the May 1, 2027 Texas election turns these dates into a week-by-week schedule.

Step 5

Text the supporters who asked to hear from you.

Text messages help you reach supporters at the moments that matter: when early voting opens, before an event, and on election day. 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.
2. Check that your filing is viewable online. Before you request Campaign Verify, confirm that your committee's filing can be found online. 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, before the election. A request made on or after November 15, 2026 lasts until Wednesday, January 31, 2029.
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 a 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.

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 Texas local race. Our post on Campaign Verify for local candidates explains verification in more depth, and our political texting guide covers the rules that apply in every state.

Guides for each part of the race.

• Texas May 2027 election calendar for city and school candidates
• How to run for city council in Texas
• How to run for mayor in Texas
• How to run for school board in Texas
• The Texas application for a place on the ballot, step by step
• A campaign plan to the May 1, 2027 Texas election
• Texting voters in a Texas local race: consent and setup