Exactly 29,803 formal votes have been counted so far, with the No vote currently slightly ahead with 15,368 votes or 51.57 per cent of the total.

If the No vote wins out, Wagga will stick to its current system where the city's councillors decide the mayor among themselves every two years.

However, all the online and postal votes, as well as about 1300 ballots from the Lutheran Primary School polling station, are yet to be recorded and could swing the outcome in either direction.

If these closing votes are heavily in favour of Yes, the referendum could flip and Wagga would begin holding an election every four years, with residents choosing who wears the mayoral chains.

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Kooringal resident Terry Ahern spent the weeks leading up to the referendum passionately advocating for the community to vote No and was glad to see his preferred outcome in a slender lead.

"That is very good and it means there is light at the end of the tunnel - we've got a bit of a chance," he said.

Mr Ahern admitted he was surprised to see how close the referendum has been so far and said he would be nervous until the outcome was confirmed.

"Everybody I've spoken to was going to vote No so I was shocked when the Yes vote was winning [on Saturday]," he said.

Mr Ahern said he was against the motion for residents to decide their own mayor because he felt a candidate could buy themselves into the role if they had significant resources.

"It opens up the mayor position to people who can spend more money to buy more advertisements and promote themselves," he said.

"We don't vote in the Premier or the Prime Minister so I don't think we should vote the mayor in."

The passionate resident also felt a four-year term would make it too difficult to remove a mayor if they were not up to the task.

The Currawarna Community Hall polling station was the most united in their referendum votes so far, with 75 of the area's 114 formal ballots all voting 'No' to the proposal (65.7 per cent).

The polling station where voters were most in favour of a change in system was Kooringal Public School, where 930 of the 1166 voters put 'Yes' on their referendum paper (57.7 per cent).

The final referendum votes will be recorded over the next few days.

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