Term limits are a structural mechanism put into law to limit the number of terms (a defined number years) that someone can serve as an elected officials.

When people push for term limits for officials, it is usually because they want to prevent individual officials from consolidating too much power, or because they believe that officials should be citizens first, with a real world perspective – rather than being members of a professional political class.

With term limits in place, incumbents (or people currently in office) usually run for re-election until they reach their term limit.

In NYC 2017, some officials are limited to 2 terms in office, and others in the same position are limited to 3 terms – how can that be?

It’s a long story…

NYC first established term limits in 1993, when voters approved a public referendum to amend the City Charter (the city’s foundational legal document), so that the city’s elected officials could serve for a consecutive maximum of 2 terms of 4 years each (possible total: 8 years) for all city offices: mayor, comptroller, public advocate, borough presidents, and council members.

In 2008, the NYC Council and former Mayor Bloomberg passed an amendment to the law to extend term limits, for a consecutive maximum of 3 terms of 4 years (possible total: 12 years).

In 2010, as a response to public criticism around the term limits extension, Mayor Bloomberg created a Charter Revision Commission to consider this and other issues (CRCs can study the whole City Charter, and propose changes to the voters through questions on the ballot).

The 2010 Commission submitted to voters a proposal that some argue was a political compromise: to reinstate limits of 2 4-year terms, but only for elected officials elected after 2013 – everyone currently sitting in elected office while the Commission was in operation would be eligible for 3 year terms.

This proposal was approved by the voters via referendum. So, while some elected officials are limited to serving 2 consecutive terms of 4 years each, some members of the NYC Council are able to run for re-election this year for a 3rd term, despite having already served for 2 full terms.

Term limits play an interesting role in NYC elections, particularly in 2017 and 2021!

This year, of the 59 city elected officials, 25 are limited to 3 terms and 34 are limited to 2 terms. Of the City Council’s 51 members, 47% can run for 3 terms, while 51% can run for 2 terms.

In 2021, 39 of the 51 council members will be term-limited out of office (would be 40, but 1 incumbent is not running for re-election) – so that 75% of the city council will be newly elected.

Note: district attorneys and judges are actually officials of the state, and not the city – so the term limits question does not apply to them in the same way. There are no term limits for DAs in NYS, and judges generally can sit for unlimited terms until they reach the age of 70.

Want a quick way to see which office has 2 terms and which has 3 terms?

We’ve distilled it for you! Check out our graphics and explanatory diagrams here.