For Immediate Release

Contact: Amy Brendmoen
June 4, 2008 651-492-8488

Instant Runoff Voting Petition Filed in St. Paul 7,168 Voters Sign to Seek Election Reform in November

The St. Paul Better Ballot Campaign today filed a petition seeking reform to the current municipal election process. At least 7,168 voters signed on in support of Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) for mayoral and city council races. With 2,070 more signatures than required by law, local volunteers expect that the petition will be certified and the question will appear before voters in November.

(FairVote Minnesota)

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Folks in the Vermont state house are "cautiously optimistic" that Governor Douglas will sign on to S.108, Vermont's own instant runoff bill. It had passed the Vermont Senate last year and was sent over to the House. S.108 passed it's third reading in the House last Friday, and now it is on for any reconciliation and then to the governor for signing.

A little mea culpa (I think) below

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My Vermont State House birdies tell me that Vermont's current instant runoff voting proposal, S.108, will probably not be moving ahead before town meeting day (March 4th).

This is a great time to write a letter, call in to talk radio shows and discuss IRV with your friends, neighbors, co-workers, acquaintances and maybe even perfect strangers. Direct contact with your legislators and the Governor are also must dos at this point.

Vermont Speaker of the House Gaye Symington says she supports instant runoff voting, is well aware of S.108 and wants to see that bill passed out of committee.

In her own words below the break ...

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Springfield, Ill absolutely has instant runoff voting albeit on a limited scale. Like Arkansas, Louisiana, and South Carolina, Springfield has instituted IRV for absentee balloting only. Springfield's absentee instant runoff voting, however, is even more restrictive in that it specifically applies only to those "who are eligible to vote as provided in the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, set forth in the United States Code, Title 42, Section 1973ff et seq" (see here for the proposition's wording.), whereas the three above mentioned states use it for all absentee voting foreign and domestic.

I got a chance to talk to several folks from Illinois about Springfield specifically and statewide attempts at instituting IRV more broadly. Here's what I found out ...

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I know, this isn't quite in line with my last two posts looking into whether Arkansas; South Carolina; Louisiana; and Springfield, Illinois really do or don't have instant runoff elections, but I'll get back to that tomorrow ... or the next day.

Today is about Oregon and what happened to IRV there earlier this year. For a brief background see this post and this post from IRV Oregon.

I had a chance to talk with Oregon Representative Peter Buckley who sponsored HB 2761, a bill to implement IRV. Here's what I was told.

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I want to thank Bob Richard from Marin Ranked Voting for some really great input and additional information (see the comments in this post for more).

Among the points he raised was

The Arkansas, South Carolina, Louisiana, and Springfield, IL, laws in your list are IRV only by stretching the definition further than I'd like.

. . .

In each of these four places, the election itself is a standard two-round runoff. The ballots for the runoff election can't be prepared and mailed until the results of the preliminary round are known. So at least some overseas voters wouldn't receive their runoff ballots and return them in time to be counted. The rules effectively disenfranchise some overseas voters.

So, being what I am, I went looking for more information, and what I found was regarding South Carolina technically he is correct ... but regarding South Carolina technically Bob is incorrect.

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“The instant runoff shall be conducted in rounds. In each round, each voter's ballot shall count as a single vote for whichever continuing candidate the voter has ranked highest.” (Pierce County, WA charter amendment enabling the use if IRV)

Here's my current list of IRV and where it's being used or being voted on in the US: Arkansas; Aspen, CO; Berkeley, CA; Burlington, VT; Cary, NC; Hendersonville, NC; Ferndale, MI; Louisiana; Minneapolis, MN; North Carolina; Oakland, CA; Pierce County, WA; San Francisco, CA; Sarasota, FL; South Carolina; Springfield, IL; Tacoma Park, MD; Urbana, IL; Utah Republican Party; and Washington. Details after the fold ...

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