Charlie Gerdes won a majority Tuesday night – so why does he have to run again in November?

In some of the country's more progressive cities, instant run-off voting has been adopted, which, among other things, eliminates the need for a primary election.

Since nobody is clamoring for it in St. Petersburg, we're not about to lead that campaign. But forgive us for thinking there's something a bit off about having a primary election in which the sole purpose is to eliminate (in this case) three candidates to two, with those two candidates now running against each other for another two months – despite the fact that one of the candidates took a clear majority in the race.

We're referring of course, to Tuesday night's primary race in St. Petersburg's District 1 race. Charlie Gerdes won 52 percent of the vote, some 24 points up on Bob Kersteen (Josh Shulman took 20 percent and fell out of the race).

Tampa this past year had a series of primary elections, but if one of the candidates took home 50 percent plus one (as was the case in the races of Charlie Miranda and Mary Mulhern), they become the winner, and save the city the expense (and themselves) of running again in three weeks.

This article appears in Sep 1-7, 2011.