Increasingly, business people are deciding it’s time to step up and be more involved in the political process, not just supporting like-minded candidates, but by becoming one themselves.
To facilitate this trend, the Florida Institute for Political Leadership (FIPL) has created a comprehensive database of local elections across Florida to help Floridians take the next step in their political career.
FIPL offers free access to this database using a new search feature under the “Elections” tab on its fipl.org website. The first of its kind in Florida and offered exclusively by FIPL, the tool allows users to see what elections are upcoming in their local area – from municipal-level government to state and federal elected positions. Users can filter results, narrowing down respective searches by county, category, next election year and type of elected office. Fipl.org/elections also provides contact information for state and county elections officials.
“FIPL continuously launches new updates, tools, and other resources to assist Floridians interested in running for office or planning to run in the future,” said FIPL Executive Director Rick Asnani. “We put together a statewide elections database to complement our current educational offerings by providing centralized access to upcoming local elections. Our goal is to equip people with the information and tools they need to plan their political future and be successful.”
A team of eight researchers acquired local election information for all of Florida’s 67 counties dating back to early February 2020. The database includes nearly 4,200 elected positions at the state and local level, covering elections in all of Florida’s 67 counties and over 400 municipalities through 2027. The team discovered there are almost 200 local races yet to occur in 2021 and another 2,000+ on the ballot in 2022, excluding special taxing districts.
FIPL is a non-partisan program designed to recruit, train and guide people by providing leadership and training opportunities to get better candidates across the State of Florida. Organized, funded and managed by the Florida Chamber of Commerce, the institute partners with local chambers of commerce and interested organizations across Florida to host campaign schools and training programs. To date, FIPL has hosted 13 campaign schools and partnered with 46 local Chamber hosts, and 22 community partner co-hosts in 23 different counties. The program has trained 601 participants with 437 graduates, of whom 70 percent plan to run for office.