||| FROM TONY P. GHAZEL, BILL APPEL, TOM STAR, and PAUL DOSSETT |||
Ranked Choice Voting (RCV), the latest fashion in election tinkering, is unneeded in our county. Our current system works well and our local elections officials do a tremendous job leading a process that is well respected and garners high voter turnout. In the rare instance that there are more than two candidates for local elections, the primary election promotes the top two vote getters to the November election. Very simple and clear and does not need a computer to analyze intent, redistribute votes of the candidate who is dropped off and declare a winner, according to some algorithm that could be manipulated. Our voters and candidates deserve a clearly and immediately understandable vote counting system, not one that involves a complicated process of ranking candidates and possibly repeating vote counts by a computer, leading to possible mischief.
This will cause confusion in the election process during times when elections results are under suspicion and will not enhance voter confidence.
Additionally, this poorly conceived proposition does not describe any particular form of RCV (in fact there is more than one) and it’s “out of area” promoters and supporters are promising a “fix” but in reality, the result will be confusion, surprise, distrust, and further alienation from our democratic institutions.
There are many loose ends as this proposal is dependent on when and what the State legislature actually does with RCV. Our county cannot itself initiate RCV. Please join us in rejecting this proposition 3.
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This letter is truly disappointing, authored as it is by people who have contributed much to the life of this county. Ranked-choice voting will change the outcome of few San Juan County elections, and for those few that it might change, the outcome will arguably more closely reflect the will of the voters. The notion that SJC voters can’t cope with an RCV system is just absurd.
Our current election system does mostly work quite well. However to insinuate that RCV is “some algorithm that could be manipulated” is simply nonsense. RCV algorithms are simple and the results are no harder to verify than the usual “first past the post”. Many of our elections are two-candidate (or, sadly, single-candidate) affairs, and the result of any RCV system in those cases would be exactly the same as in “first past the post”. Mary Peltola won Alaska’s seat in Congress in a RCV election – but in fact would have won under the system that we are used to. The numbers are transparent and easy to understand – look at Ballotpedia. Jared Golden represents Maine’s 2nd District due to winning a RCV election in 2018, after polling 2nd in the first round – again, not at all hard to understand, and arguably much better representing the voter’s intent than what “first past the post” would have produced. Oregon is in danger of electing a governor whom a majority of Oregonians don’t want, an outcome that would be extremely unlikely under RCV.
Votes are counted by a computer in any case, and RCV counts can just as easily be verified by hand as “first past the post” (i.e., painfully!). Yes, there are multiple RCV algorithms, and the state gets to choose, by state law – that’s why the current proposition cannot specify this choice. Short of violating state law, there is no other way to write the measure.
The basic message of their letter is that San Juan County voters cannot deal with an election system “… that involves a complicated process of ranking candidates”. That phrase does not describe the outcome of Proposition 3 approval. None of the likely RCV systems are complicated. I reject the notion that SJC voters are stupider than those in Alaska or Maine.
Thank you William for your thoughtful and more importantly, factual, rebuttal of the disappointing letter to the editor regarding RCV. Many other states, counties and cities are looking to implement RCV because of all of the reasons you point out. When considering whether to place this Proposition on the ballot, the San Juan County Charter Review Commission heard from many local citizens and also the organization Fair Vote Washington who possessed significant information regarding RCV. I would encourage every interested San Juan County citizen to review the organization’s website at https://fairvotewa.org/ and also research how the process is working in Maine and Alsaka and elsewhere and develop your own opinion and then… vote!
This is what I like to see. An informed civil discussion about different views. We the voters, get to choose. I think the comment about the situation in Oregon is really important.
You know what ranked voting gave Alaska in the last election? A Republican senator (Lisa Murkowski) endorsing a Democrat for the House (Mary Peltola, who is also the first Alaska Native to win that seat to replace Don Young after he died) and Mary Peltola endorsing Lisa Murkowski. Two moderates who work and endorse the best person for Alaska, not the persons their parties ordered them to endorse or be cast out of their little club that until ranked voting controlled who could run under their respective banners. As the Alaska Supreme court noted this week, in response to a lawsuit filed by the Republicans, political parties do not get to control how elections are run. Since the state’s constitution does not prohibit ranked voting, it is allowed. They have been trying to overturn ranked voting since the people voted it in during the last major election. Power to the People!!
RCV has many supporters. So does our present system. Whether one or the other fits will be up to the voters.
My individual concern is that the process of voting, being the deepest foundation of our democracy, be well understood to assure confidence in our democratic institutions. Confusion generates innuendos and worse. Even if I thought RCV were a good alternative for the county to follow, I would say even then, with regret, that the timing for locking our county into whatever form of RCV the Legislature eventually authorizes, could not be worse chosen.
Let’s let the dust settle around our neighbors’ experimentation and more important, heal the damage done and being done to confidence in elections before blindly committing to what is less well understood by our electorate.