Voters in the St. Thomas community cast their votes in the 2021 municipal election Tuesday at St. Thomas’ McNeely Hall and the Merriam Park Recreation Center in St. Paul.

St. Paul voters are choosing between nine mayoral candidates, including incumbent Melvin Carter, as well as school board members and a rent stabilization proposal that would cap the yearly increase of rent at 3% and be one of the strictest in the country if passed.

A majority of St. Paul residents are renters, with the rental population most dense in areas surrounding St. Thomas, making the ballot question regarding the proposal a prominent issue for St. Thomas students.

Incumbent Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey fell short of claiming victory Tuesday, but leads the race with 42.79% of the vote, needing 50% to win outright with Minneapolis’ ranked-choice voting.

Under the city’s ranked-choice voting system, officials will begin calculating second- and third-place choices Wednesday to determine a winner.

If Frey remains in office, he stands to benefit from voters’ approval of another ballot question Tuesday — one that moves the city to a strong-mayor form of government.

“I’m not going to give any grand pronouncements at this moment, but I will say we are winning, and we are winning by a whole lot,” Frey said in a speech at the Jefe Urban Cocina restaurant in Minneapolis.

Frey, who has been a vocal opponent of replacing the Minneapolis Police Department with a Department of Public Safety, called for unity to pursue cultural change. Fifty-six percent of Minneapolis residents voted against this measure in Tuesday’s election.

Leila Weah can be reached at leila.weah@stthomas.edu.