Sorry if this is a dumb question but I genuinely looked for an answer before asking here.
Since we're having a moderator election, I find myself curious about the mechanics of moderator elections and I can't find any details. So really while I'm especially curious about why we are having the currently scheduled moderator election, really I just don't know generally what the rules are for electing moderators. How many moderators should there be? How often are elections held? etc.
It's very nicely addressed in the main meta:
When do elections take place?
The community team periodically looks at the work load on graduated sites and will reach out to the moderation team if it looks like more help might be needed. Broadly, it's up to the moderation teams to indicate whether they need additional hands, and how many sets of hands would be ideal.
Although we'll reach out to moderators on the anniversary of their last election, just to see how they're doing, elections do not always take place at the same time every year. Sometimes a year can even go by without any election at all. Most elections are scheduled as a result of moderators reaching out to Stack Exchange to ask for additional help.
And from the beta stage they start with selecting three. But can increase with the workload. The election can also happen when someone from current team step-down which is happening here.
