Montgomery County, MD Green Party Blog

Voters in Cary, North Carolina became the first in the state to use instant runoff voting, and the vote seems to have gone very smoothly.

“I thought it was really positive,” said Alex Funk, a retired engineer who biked to the Herbert C. Young Community Center to vote. “I mean, why do this all twice?”

Next month voters in Hendersonville, North Carolins will use the system in their City Council election.

On the negative side,

On October 14, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed AB 1294, the bill to let all cities and counties use Instant-Runoff Voting for elections for their own officers. His veto message says, “This represents a drastic change to the way we vote. I am concerned that we don’t yet know enough about how voters will react to such a dramatic change. Charter cities and counties already have the right to hold ranked voting elections, yet only one city has done so thus far.”  Several cities in California have already voted to use Instant-Runoff Voting, but state law prevents them from implementing their choice because they aren’t charter cities.

Broder opposes Democracy at the Federal level of U.S. Government.

That’s right, folks: The Washington Post Columnist David S. Broder opposes the principle of one-person-one-vote at the Federal level. If you do not believe me, then check out his column for yourself. It does not make for just interesting reading — it makes for incredible reading. He justifies his opposition to one-person-one-vote at the Federal level (Although, given the way he frames the issue, he almost certainly opposes one-person-one-vote at the state level as well.) on the grounds that the two party system might suffer. It is quite obvious that he is contemptuous of any voter who supports an independent/third-party candidate. This does beg the following question: Is he an elitist? Does he support the interests of the wealthy at the expense of the common people? Before reading this column, I would immediately have dismissed this question from my mind as being ridiculous; but now I can no longer do so. All of his rationalizations come straight out of the elite playbook: Say that you are opposing this in order to protect minorities (while at the same time opposing any allocation of any meaningful resources to assist said minorities that are discriminated against in the popular culture); Say that you are opposing this in order to protect the family farmer (while at the same time supporting corporate farmers at the expense of the small stakeholder); in short, say and do anything in order to maintain your political hegemony in this country — and indeed, throughout the world.

I never before would have argued that Broder is an elitist — but now I wonder.

From Ballot Access News:

Vermont Secretary of State Deb Markowitz is asking the Vermont legislature to pass a bill that would let Vermont use Instant-Runoff Voting for one or two particular state offices in the future. The legislature will decide which offices. Markowitz then plans to use a hand-count for whichever offices are chosen. She feels this is the only practical solution, since each Vermont town decides for itself which vote-counting technology to use.

From Ballot Access News:

All four ballot measures to institute alternative voting systems passed on November 7. Oakland, California, passed IRV for city office by 68%. Minneapolis passed IRV for city office by 65%.

Two more advanced forms seem to have passed narrowly. In Pierce County, Washington (that state’s 2nd most populous county, which contains Tacoma), all partisan county offices will apparently no longer have partisan primaries. Instead, there will be a single election in November, using IRV. Although ballot access will be easy for all candidates, party labels will be restricted to those candidates who had won their party’s nomination by convention, in advance of the election. Pierce County now more closely approximates the systems used by Ireland and the Australia than any other jurisdiction in the U.S. 

Finally, Davis passed advisory measure J (with 55%), which provides for Single Transferrable Vote for multi-winner offices such as City Council-at-large. Like all California elections for city office, Davis uses non-partisan elections. However, Davis will now apparently share the characteristic of Cambridge, Massachusetts, under which an organized minority of voters can place a candidate on the city council if that minority comprises approximately 25% (in Cambridge the threshold is lower than 25%, because Cambridge elects more members to its city council).

From Ballot Access News:

At least three cities, and one county, are asking the voters this November if they wish to use the system for local elections. Those jurisdictions are Pierce County, Washington; Minneapolis; Oakland, California; and Davis, California. And on July 27, the North Carolina legislature passed HB 1024, to let ten cities and ten counties experiment with IRV during 2007 and 2008.