||| FROM SHARON ABREU |||
Voting is one of our most important civic activities. While Washington works hard to stay at the forefront of good election practices, there’s one way we could do better. Ranked-choice voting (RCV) is a simple change in the way we vote that’s becoming popular across the U.S.
RCV gives you the option to rank candidates on your ballot in your order of preference. It’s a “single transferable vote,” so if your preferred candidate can’t win, your vote moves to your next choice, provided you’ve indicated a next choice. You’re free to mark only one candidate if that’s what you want to do, but you also have the option to rank the candidates.
This allows you to vote for the candidate you really like the best, even if you think that candidate may not be popular with other voters. You don’t have to vote for a “lesser evil,” or worry that voting for your favorite candidate will result in “throwing away” your vote or “splitting the vote.” RCV gives you more choice and more voice in our elections.
In a time when the electorate feels so divided, support for RCV crosses party lines. It has recently been adopted in conservative states like Alaska and Utah, the purple state of Maine, and progressive cities like Santa Fe, Minneapolis, and New York. It discourages negative campaigning because candidates know they are unlikely to be your second choice if they trash your candidate. In turn, more civil, issues-based campaigns encourage more people to run for office. In addition, RCV can in effect combine primary and general elections, saving candidates and the public money.
RCV will be on our ballot in San Juan County this November, as well as in Clark County and Seattle. If RCV passes here in San Juan County, it will go into our County Charter, to go into effect once legislation passes on the state level. Putting RCV in our Charter now signals to the state that San Juan County is ready for RCV! The reason to not start actually using RCV yet is that we want the whole state to start using RCV in some capacity. Once that happens, the Secretary of State can determine what software we would use statewide and
that would be streamlined across the state. Having the state determine and purchase the software would likely save us money.
Currently, there are two RCV bills in the Washington State legislature – one is a Local Options bill and the other is a Presidential Primaries bill. It would be great for these to pass in the next legislative session. So if you’d like to see that happen, please call our state legislators and let them know. Here is their contact information:
- Rep. Debra Lekanoff (360) 786-7800
- Rep. Alex Ramel (360) 786-7970
- Sen. Liz Lovelett (360) 786-7678
RCV is a good deal for voters in SJC! Learn more at fairvotewa.org.
Thanks for this useful and timely clarification, Sharon. Making clear that RCV still allows voters to select only their favorite candidate, if they so choose, completely demolishes the distortion (promulgated by the Heritage Foundation) that RCV will force them to vote for candidates they oppose — the so-called “lesser evil” myth. RCV has all the benefits you mention. Let’s hope it’s adopted.