So you’re a Town of Telluride citizen, and you’ve been bombarded with information from the ballot questions that want your tax money. Well, what about the “other” town ballot question – should the town start using Instant Runoff Voting to elect our Mayor? Doesn’t seem very important, does it? Well, it is very important, and it has huge potential to make this country a better democracy.
So, what’s the problem with the way we vote now?
The way we vote now in Telluride (and most places in the U.S.) is called “plurality” voting: the candidate with the most votes is elected. This is fine when there are only two candidates in a race. When three or more candidates compete for an office, the winning candidate often receives less than 50 percent of the vote. This means that a majority of voters actually preferred someone else other than the person who was elected. This violates the commonsense principle that a candidate elected ought to be preferred by a majority of the voters, right?
So for example, in 2000, George Bush ran against Al Gore, and Ralph Nader won enough votes that neither candidate had a majority (over 50 percent). And there was a lot of discussion that a vote for Ralph Nader was a “wasted” vote, since it likely allowed the less popular (George Bush) candidate to get elected. So, if Ralph Nader’s votes had been distributed between Bush and Gore, who would the people have preferred?
The same was also true in 1992, Bill Clinton was elected with only 43 percent of the vote (not a majority of over 50 percent), with George Bush receiving 37 percent and Ross Perot 19 percent. If Ross Perot hadn’t been there, who would the people who have voted for him voted for?
Even this year, there are 16 candidates on the ballot! We know that 15 of those are not going to win, so most of us automatically rule out voting for anyone but the few most popular. And even thought it isn’t a very democratic system, some of us end up voting for who we think will win, NOT for who we really want and identify with…
Locally, in our last mayoral election in November 2007, yet again a similar situation occurred: Stu Fraser won with 46 percent of the vote, Terry Tice had 44 percent and Chance Leoff had 10 percent. So the buzz around town was: how would the election have turned out if we knew who would the people who voted for Chance have voted for?
Here’s the cool part: with IRV in place, the will of the people triumphs, and we get to know who is really desired by the people. How?
With IRV, people rank their candidates in order of preference. If a candidate receives a majority (over 50 percent) of first choices, he or she is elected and the process is over. But if no candidate receives a majority, the candidate with the fewest first choices (the lowest number of votes) is eliminated. Then, voters who ranked that candidate first now have their ballots counted for their second choice. The process continues until a candidate earns a majority of votes.
By ranking candidates, voters are able to express their true preferences without worrying if their vote is wasted: people vote for who they want not just for who they think will win. For this reason, IRV often leads to a higher voter turnout because voters feel that their vote matters.
So who supports IRV? First off, it is a non-partisan issue: both John McCain and Barack Obama support IRV.
Second, it has already been approved in Colorado for mayoral elections by voters in Basalt and Aspen. It has also been approved across the country by communities in fifteen states: Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, North Carolina, South Carolina, Vermont, and Washington. Forms of it are also being used in Ireland, New Zealand, and Australia – for the last 80 years!
Third, the Colorado State Legislature passed legislation this year “concerning the use of ranked voting methods, and…authorizing cities [in Colorado]…to use ranked voting.” So, we are simply following direction of the state to give this a try.
If the citizens of Telluride adopt this initiative, it would only be for a trial basis of three election cycles for mayor (when there are three or more candidates).
And in the BIG picture, if we start to use it here and we like it, maybe voters will begin to use it statewide and then maybe for President? Who knows? So, let’s start getting familiar with it and offer Telluride a better form of democracy.
Please vote yes for instant runoff voting (Question No. 202) in the Town of Telluride.
Want to know more? Go to YouTube and search for “Instant Runoff Voting” or check out www.FairVote.org and www.InstantRunoff.com.
This system is for the "well, I just can't decide, i like them both" crowd. so this systems answer to that is: "well, pick the one you like more 1st and then you can pick the one you also like 2nd, this increased the odds that the one of the two you like becomes the winner."
our forefathers are officially rolling over in their graves.
1 person 1 vote. VOTE NO ON IRV!
Think of it in terms of our recent election in Telluride. If you voted for Chance 1st and Terry 2nd, your second ranking vote then becomes your primary vote, and you end up voting for and electing Terry.
You don't get to vote twice in America and this system allows you to. What a crock! Basically, we are allowing the voters that voted for the loser to elect the winner? What!
Chris and his friends can't put up a real candidate to win, so they are scheming to change the election system so that if their candidate comes out in second place, they could end up winning.
Just because other people are doing it, doesn't mean we should.
Chris, your system addresses receiving a majority of the votes, but how does it address the loser becoming the winner? (In this system, if you vote for the underdog, you get two votes...one for the candidate that lost and the second for the candidate that would have lost, but now wins).
And candidates have to court peoples 1st preference vote and their 2nd preference vote? ("We need to make sure the voters who are not voting for me, are voting for me 2nd") What?
A totally bogus system. VOTE NO! on this ballot measure.
"IRV calls for voters to rank their preferences (i.e., first, second, third, etc.) with the ballots then counted. If no single candidate receives a majority of the votes cast by all eligible voters in the first round (i.e., more votes than all other candidates combined), the lowest vote getter is eliminated. The votes are then recalculated for the remaining candidates. When there are only two candidates remaining, a majority winner can be declared. If there is a tie at any point in the process, the Town Charter rules apply."
a.) Is a voter required to rank all candidates? In other words, could a voter simply not vote in any capacity for a particular candidate? For instance, in the last mayoral election, I would not want even the lowest rank to be some sort of indication I was even slightly in favor of their presence in office.
b.) According to the initiative, (after ranking) 'the ballots are then counted'. What does this mean? Do we simply add up all the '#1' votes for each candidate? Seems this is what it's trying to say, but it's implied vs. being spelled out. It could mean something along the lines of adding up all votes (regardless of rank) and coming up with an average. Sorry, 'common sense' does not apply as far as interpretation goes. The language needs to be explicit and logical (in the strict sense of the word).
c.) If there's not a majority after the first round (however this is calculated), then 'the votes are then recalculated for the remaining candidates'. How? My guess is the ranked votes for remaining candidates are added up, but not sure if it's an average, or if a voter's #2 becomes a #1 if their original choice was the candidate who was eliminated? Again, the language is not explicit.
I can see how this could get extremely verbose if spelled out completely. A longer explanation may turn some people off in the voting booth because it's difficult to understand in a short period of time. To this end, I would suggest keeping the existing language as an 'abstract', then provide more detailed clarification below.
If anything, this measure (if written correctly) could open the field to a much wider spectrum of individuals with diverse talents, yet mitigate the spoiler effect ... essentially offering the electorate the ability to take a chance on voting.