It's an odd-year general election, which means voters will decide on a lot of local races, but what happens if there are open seats and no candidates to choose from?

That's the case for some villages in Columbiana County including Rogers, Summitville and Washingtonville for positions like mayor, council members, and treasurer with open seats but no one running. 

August was the deadline for local candidates to file with the Board of Elections office in order to run for local races, but that deadline has come on gone, so voters will likely see "no valid petitions filed" under those categories on the ballot. 

This is a trend that Columbiana County Board of Elections Deputy Director Bryce Miner said is not new. 

"It seems like in each election, we are getting more and more of these no-candidate file situations," Miner said,  "I think a lot of it could be up to the political climate that we're in right now, you know, it's a difficult decision for somebody to throw their hat in the ring and run for office."

So what happens if a village has vacant seats? Columbus Attorney Donald Brey said typically, Ohio law requires the legislative authority of a statutory village to first elect a president pro tempore at their first meeting every January.

In other words, Brey said council decides. If the mayor's seat is vacant, the president of council typically becomes mayor.

"It will go to the local municipality and up to the individuals that are currently on council, so in each of these situations, there are individuals who are still elected because they have different terms," Miner said, "So it'll go up to them make these decisions."