The next elections, dated: the cycle completed to 2027

AS OF NOVEMBER 2026 · THE MACHINERY'S FORWARD FACE

The cycle: The government fragment carries the term cycles backward — the two-year mayoralty of the 1899 charter's encyclopædia account, the four-year terms of the 1921 directory, the modern four-year frame — and this entry carries the same machinery forward to its next working dates. Indiana holds its municipal elections on a fixed four-year cycle set by statute: Indiana Code 3-10-6-2 provides that a municipal primary election shall be held on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in May in 2023, 2027, 2031, and every four years thereafter, and the municipal election itself follows in November of the same years. Mishawaka's own course runs on that cycle exactly: Dave Wood was elected in his own right in 2011 and re-elected in 2015, 2019 and 2023, as the modern-mayors entry records, and the seats those elections filled — the mayor, all nine council seats and the city clerk — come due together at the cycle's next turn.

The dates: The Indiana Election Division's official 2027 election calendar, published by the Secretary of State and reflecting Indiana law as of August 2026, fixes the two days. The municipal primary election day is Tuesday, 4 May 2027. The municipal election day is Tuesday, 2 November 2027, with polling locations and vote centers open 6:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., prevailing local time. The calendar's machinery around those days is the county's to run — St. Joseph County's election board and circuit court clerk conduct the election, with voter registration for the primary closing Monday, 5 April 2027, and in-person early voting opening Tuesday, 6 April 2027, on the calendar's entries — and the city's part is the offices on the ballot: the mayor, the six district and three at-large council seats, and the city clerk, every elected office the second-class-city frame fills. The winners' terms begin at noon on Saturday, 1 January 2028: Indiana Code 36-4-5-2 sets the city executive's term at four years "beginning at noon on January 1 after election and continuing until a successor is elected and qualified," and the four-year terms of the officers elected with the mayor run from the same New Year's Day.

The next cycle after: On the statute's own sequence the following municipal elections fall in 2031 — primary on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in May, the election in November — and the dates printed above carry the calendar's own caution, which this entry keeps: election-law dates are subject to change by the Indiana General Assembly, and the 2027 calendar brochure states on its face that it reflects Indiana law as of August 2026. As of this writing, November 2026, no change to the 2027 municipal dates stands in the official calendar, and the next time Mishawaka chooses its government is 4 May and 2 November 2027.

Sources:

1. Indiana Election Division, Indiana Secretary of State, 2027 Election Calendar brochure (official calendar, reflecting Indiana law as of August 2026) — "Tuesday, May 4, 2027, PRIMARY ELECTION DAY"; "Tuesday, November 2, 2027, MUNICIPAL ELECTION DAY," polling locations and vote centers open 6:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.; voter registration ending 5 April 2027 and early voting opening 6 April 2027; and the brochure's caution that law dates are subject to change by the General Assembly.
2. Indiana Code 3-10-6-2 — the municipal primary held on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in May in 2023, 2027, 2031, 2035, and every four years thereafter, nominating the candidates to be voted for at the November municipal election.
3. Indiana Code 36-4-5-2 — the city executive's term of four years, beginning at noon on January 1 after election and continuing until a successor is elected and qualified.
4. The government fragment of this build — Wood's elections of 2011, 2015, 2019 and 2023 on the same cycle; the offices the frame elects (mayor, nine council members, city clerk); and the term cycles as they stood in 1899 and 1921.