BILL ANALYSIS
AB 1121
Page 1
Date of Hearing: April 21, 2009
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON ELECTIONS AND REDISTRICTING
Paul Fong, Chair
AB 1121 (Davis) - As Introduced: February 27, 2009
SUBJECT : Elections: ranked voting.
SUMMARY : Requires the Secretary of State (SOS) to approve not
more than 10 cities and counties, in total, to conduct a local
election using ranked voting (RV) if certain conditions are met.
Specifically, this bill :
1)Defines the following terms, for the purposes of this bill:
a) "Ranked voting" means an election method in which voters
rank the candidates for office in order of preference, and
the ballots are counted in rounds.
b) "Qualified candidate" means any candidate listed on the
ballot for the election or any write-in candidate qualified
for participation in the election.
c) "Ranking" for a candidate on a voter's ballot is the
number assigned to that candidate by the voter to express
his or her preference for that candidate. The "highest
ranking" is the ranking with the lowest numerical value for
a qualified candidate. The "highest continuing ranking" is
the ranking with the lowest numerical value for a
continuing candidate.
d) "Continuing ballot" means a ballot that counts towards a
candidate.
e) "Continuing candidate" means a qualified candidate that
has not been elected or eliminated.
2)Allows a total of 10 general law cities and counties to
conduct a local election using RV. Allows a general law city
or county to submit a written request to the SOS for
authorization to use RV in a local election, and requires the
SOS to approve each request in the order of receipt until a
total of 10 cities and counties have been authorized to use
RV.
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3)Prohibits a city or county from conducting a local election
using RV unless that election is conducted on a voting system
that is capable of conducting the election using RV and that
voting system has been certified for use in the state by the
SOS, or the election is conducted by another procedure
approved by the SOS which at a minimum include detailed
specifications for counting, auditing, and reporting of
results.
4)Provides that RV may be adopted for use pursuant to this bill
in a general law city or county by approval of a ballot
measure submitted to the voters by the governing body or by an
initiative measure.
5)Requires a city or county that uses RV in an election to
conduct that election subject to the following conditions:
a) The city or county must conduct a voter education and
outreach campaign to familiarize voters with RV. This
education and outreach campaign must be conducted in
English and in every language that a ballot is required to
be made available pursuant to state and federal law.
b) The RV ballot must allow voters to rank as many choices
as there are candidates, unless the voting equipment cannot
feasibly accommodate a number of rankings on the ballot
equal to the number of candidates, in which case the
elections official may limit the number of choices that a
voter may rank to the maximum number allowed by the
equipment. This limit may not be less than three
candidates.
c) A RV ballot may not interfere with a voter's ability to
rank at least two write-in candidates. A mark for an
unqualified write-in candidate on an RV ballot is not
considered a mark for a candidate, and that ballot is
advanced to the next candidate.
6)Provides that a RV method used to elect a single candidate to
office is known as "instant runoff voting" (IRV). Provides
that IRV elections shall be conducted in the following manner:
a) At the beginning of each round, every ballot is counted
as a vote towards the candidate indicated by the highest
continuing ranking on that ballot.
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b) After each round, if more than two candidates remain,
the candidate receiving the smallest number of votes is
eliminated, and each ballot counted toward that candidate
is advanced to the next-ranked continuing candidate on the
ballot. If two or more candidates tie for the smallest
number of votes, the candidate to eliminate is chosen by
lot.
c) Once only two candidates remain, the candidate with the
greatest number of votes is elected. If there is a tie
between the two candidates, the tie is broken by lot.
d) If during the elimination stage of any round, a
candidate has more votes than the combined vote total of
all candidates with fewer votes, but that candidate does
not have a majority of votes, all the candidates with fewer
votes than the candidate are eliminated simultaneously.
e) Provides that if a voting system cannot feasibly
continue the count until only two candidates remain, the
system may terminate the count when a candidate receives a
majority of votes from the continuing ballots, and the
candidate who received a majority of votes shall be
declared elected.
7)Provides that a RV method used to elect two or more candidates
to office is known as "choice voting" (CV). Provides that CV
elections shall be conducted in the following manner:
a) The minimum threshold of votes necessary to be elected
is determined by dividing the total number of votes cast
for that office by one plus the number of seats to be
filled, then by adding one vote to that total and ignoring
any fraction.
b) Each ballot is allocated to the candidate with the
highest ranking on that ballot.
c) If a candidate on the first count has a number of
highest ranking votes exactly equal to the minimum number
of votes needed to be elected, the candidate is declared
elected and the counted ballots indicating that candidate
as a highest ranking are put aside and the other rankings
on the ballots are not examined.
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d) If a candidate on the first count gains more than the
minimum number of votes needed to be elected, the candidate
is declared elected and the number of votes in excess of
the number of votes needed to be elected (also known as
"surplus votes") is recorded. All the ballots on which
that candidate had the highest ranking are reexamined and
assigned to candidates not yet elected according to the
highest continuing ranking on those ballots. Those ballots
are allocated according to a "transfer value," which is
determined by taking the number of surplus votes cast for
the elected candidate divided by the total number of votes
received by the elected candidate, calculated to four
decimal places.
e) If two or more candidates on the first count gain more
than the minimum number of votes needed to be elected, all
those candidates are declared elected. Each of the ballots
of the candidate with the largest number of highest ranking
votes are reexamined first and assigned (at the transfer
value) to candidates not yet elected. The ballots for the
other elected candidates are then assigned (at the transfer
value) in order according to the number of highest ranking
votes each candidate received.
f) If a candidate receives more than the minimum number of
votes needed to be elected as the consequence of a transfer
of votes from an elected candidate, the number of votes in
excess of the number of votes needed to be elected are
transferred to the other candidates at a transfer value.
In this case, the transfer value for ballots transferred to
the candidate from one or more elected candidates is
determined pursuant to the following formula:
Surplus votes cast for the elected candidate, divided
by the total number of votes received by the elected
candidate, multiplied by the previous transfer value
of the ballot received by that candidate, calculated
out to four decimal places.
The transfer value for other ballots is determined by
taking the number of surplus votes cast for the elected
candidate divided by the total number of votes received by
the elected candidate, calculated to four decimal places.
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g) At any stage at which no candidate has a number of votes
equal to or greater than the minimum number of votes needed
to be elected, the candidate with the smallest number of
votes is eliminated, and ballots that were transferred to
that candidate from other candidates are transferred at the
transfer value at which the ballots were received. All
other ballots are transferred at full value.
h) When the number of elected and continuing candidates is
equal to the number of candidates to be elected, all the
continuing candidates are declared elected even though they
may not have reached the minimum threshold of votes
necessary to be elected.
8)Requires the following information to be reported after each
RV election:
a) A "summary report" listing the candidate vote totals in
each round, along with the cumulative number of undervotes,
overvotes, and exhausted ballots in each round.
b) A "ballot image report" listing the candidate or
candidates indicated at each ranking for each ballot, along
with the precinct of the ballot and whether the ballot was
cast by mail.
c) A "comprehensive report" that breaks down the numbers in
the summary report by precinct.
9)Requires preliminary versions of the summary report and ballot
image report to be made available as soon as possible after
the commencement of the official canvass of the vote and prior
to manual tally of ballots cast in one percent of precincts
that is required under existing law. Additionally requires
ballot image reports to be posted on the elections official's
Internet Web site as soon as possible after the close of polls
at an election where RV is used.
10)Contains a January 1, 2019 sunset date.
EXISTING LAW does not allow general law cities or counties to
conduct elections using RV.
FISCAL EFFECT : Unknown
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COMMENTS :
1)Purpose of the Bill : According to the author:
Existing law provides procedures for the nomination of
candidates for elective offices in general law cities. It
specifies the procedures for the conduct of the election,
the canvass of ballots, and certification of persons
elected to office. Related provisions require the holding
of a runoff election if no candidate has been elected at
the municipal election.
Despite growing public interest in using ranked voting
systems such as instant runoff voting, most local
jurisdictions are not able to use ranked voting systems
under current law. Today only charter counties or charter
cities can use ranked voting, but over three-fourths of
cities and counties are general law jurisdictions and don't
have these options. Over half of all Californians live in a
general law city, a general law county, or both, and are
currently denied the opportunity to benefit from these
better voting systems.
In addition, there are no statewide standards for how
ranked voting elections should be conducted, creating both
the possibility of inconsistent implementations, as well as
additional burdens on local officials, in those charter
cities and counties that have already adopted ranked
voting.
Instant runoff voting (IRV) ensures that the winner of a
single-winner election has the support of the majority of
voters in a single election. By eliminating the need for a
costly runoff election it can save local governments a lot
of money-about $1.6M per election in San Francisco alone.
IRV also eliminates vote-splitting and spoiler effects,
both of which undermine the public's confidence in the
political process.
Numerous general law cities and counties are exploring
using ranked voting methods or have an interest in doing so
if they are allowed some municipal authority to use these
systems, and the Legislature should allow these cities the
flexibility they need to serve their voters. Cities and
counties deserve the opportunity to use the electoral
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systems that best address their unique needs.
AB 1121 is a limited "local option" bill that would allow a
small number of general law cities or general law counties
to use ranked voting systems, specifically instant runoff
voting and choice voting, to elect local officials and
legislative bodies. This bill would specify the ranked
voting method as it applies to both a single-candidate
election and a multiple-candidate election. Only 10 cities
or counties would be granted this authorization. AB 1121
would NOT mandate that any jurisdictions use ranked voting,
and municipalities wishing to do so would need to obtain
voter approval for the change.
2)Author's Amendments : The author has proposed minor amendments
to this bill to eliminate two instances in which it contains
blank spaces where a specific term used in the bill is to be
defined. Those amendments are as follows:
On page 5, strike out line 23.
On page 7, line 39, strike out "For the" and strike out line 40.
This analysis reflects those proposed author's amendments.
3)Pilot Projects : This bill proposes a pilot project under
which 10 cities and counties are allowed to use RV at a single
local election between now and January 1, 2019. However, the
pilot project that would be created by this bill lacks many of
the procedures and guidelines that typically apply to pilot
projects to ensure that the pilot project is useful in
evaluating the desirability of extending the policy proposed
by the pilot project to statewide application.
First, this bill allows the first 10 cities or counties that
sign up to participate in the pilot project. Because the
localities that will participate in the pilot project will be
chosen on a "first come, first served" basis, there is no
guarantee that the 10 cities or counties will be
representative of the state as a whole, or will provide data
that will allow the Legislature to effectively evaluate the
pilot project. If the 10 cities and counties that participate
in the pilot project are not representative of the state as a
whole, it is unlikely that the pilot project will provide
useful information for the Legislature to evaluate whether it
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is appropriate to expand the application of this bill when the
pilot project ends in 2019.
Second, this bill provides no mechanism or standards for
evaluating the success or failure of the pilot project. Under
the provisions of this bill, cities and counties that conduct
an election using RV are not required to produce any kind of
report, are not required to evaluate voters' satisfaction with
RV, are not required to evaluate the costs (including any cost
savings) of using RV, and are not required to investigate and
disclose any problems that arise in conducting an election
using RV. If the pilot project proposed by this bill does not
provide this information in a standardized format, it is
unlikely that the pilot project will be useful to the
Legislature in evaluating the desirability of allowing general
law cities and counties to use RV for local elections.
Given these issues, the author and the committee may wish to
consider amendments to require the SOS to choose participants
for the pilot project from among the cities and counties that
express interest in conducting an election using RV in a
manner designed to ensure that the cities and counties that
participate in this pilot project are representative of the
state. Additionally, the author and the committee may wish to
consider requiring cities and counties that participate in the
pilot project to provide information to the SOS about the
items identified above in a format determined by the SOS, and
to require the SOS to monitor some of those elections and
compile the information from the cities and counties along
with the SOS's observations in a report to the Legislature
evaluating the conduct of RV elections in those cities and
counties and making recommendations about whether the
Legislature should authorize broader use of RV in local
elections.
4)Lack of RV-Ready Certified Voting Systems : There are no
voting systems currently certified for use in California that
have the capability to tabulate ballots cast in an IRV or CV
election. The voting system first used in San Francisco for
its elections conducted using RV was first conditionally
approved by the SOS for use in San Francisco's elections on
April 30, 2004, which permitted San Francisco to use the
system on a one-time basis for the November 2004 General
Election. After receiving reports on the system's performance
in that election at a public hearing on February 17, 2005 the
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SOS conditionally approved the system for use from March 7,
2005 until December 31, 2005 only in the City and County of
San Francisco. On August 3, 2006 the SOS received an
application requesting a one-time, final approval of the
system for use in the November 2006 General Election. That
application was approved, under the condition that the system
not be used again for any election in California.
Nonetheless, on September 14, 2007, the SOS subsequently
approved the use of the San Francisco's voting system through
December 31, 2008.
San Francisco subsequently obtained a different IRV-capable
system, but that system also was approved on a "one time"
basis for the November 2008 election. It was granted another
"one time" approval for use in the May 19, 2009 statewide
special election, but at that election, San Francisco is not
expected to conduct any races using IRV.
As a result, while San Francisco has been able to conduct
elections using IRV, it has only been due to a series of "one
time" approvals, all of which have since expired or will
expire subsequent to the May 19, 2009 statewide special
election. Furthermore, there has never been a CV-capable
voting system certified for use in California.
Given the lack of certified voting equipment that is capable of
conducting an election using RV, and given the lack of
certainty about the availability of such equipment in the
immediate future, the committee may wish to consider whether
it would be desirable to delay consideration of this measure
until such equipment is available.
Alternately, the committee may wish to consider requiring the
SOS to study and evaluate the functionality and security of
voting systems that are capable of conducting RV elections,
and to declare publicly when such a system is certified for
use in the state before accepting applications from cities and
counties to participate in the pilot project proposed by this
bill.
5)IRV in Other Jurisdictions : Although San Francisco is the
only jurisdiction in California that has used IRV for an
election, a number of other jurisdictions have approved IRV
for use in future elections. The cities of Oakland, Berkeley,
and San Leandro have all approved charter amendments to
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conduct city elections using IRV. To the committee's
knowledge, no jurisdiction in California has plans to conduct
an election using CV.
Given that only five elections have ever been conducted anywhere
in the state using IRV, and given that all five of those
elections were conducted in the same jurisdiction (San
Francisco), it is difficult to evaluate how voters around the
state might respond to IRV. On the other hand, three more
cities are scheduled to use IRV for city elections in the next
few years, which will provide a greater amount of information
about how voters in California respond to IRV.
Given that a natural pilot project of sorts will be conducted
over the next few years as a number of other cities use IRV
for local elections, the need and desirability for the
Legislature to create a pilot project is unclear.
6)Charter vs. General Law Jurisdictions : As noted above, three
cities and the City and County of San Francisco have all
chosen to conduct local elections using IRV. These
jurisdictions were able to choose to use IRV because they are
charter cities. Certain home rule provisions in California's
state constitution allow cities and counties to exercise a
greater degree of control over local affairs by adopting a
charter. According to information from the League of
California Cities, 112 of California's 480 cities are charter
cities, and according to information from the California State
Association of Counties, 14 of California's 58 counties are
charter counties. Cities and counties that are not charter
jurisdictions are commonly known as "general law"
jurisdictions.
7)CV or "Single Transferable Vote" : CV, as provided for in this
bill, is also sometimes referred to as a "Single Transferable
Vote" system. In an electoral system that uses CV, each voter
only has one vote, regardless of the number of candidates to
be elected. For instance, on a city council with three
candidates to be elected at large, a CV system allows each
voter to rank any or all candidates, but each voter
effectively only has one vote in filling those three seats.
If a voter's first choice is elected to the board with exactly
the number of votes necessary to be elected, that voter's
ballot is not used in determining which candidates will fill
the other two seats. If a voter's first choice receives more
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than the number of votes necessary to be elected, only a
portion of that voter's vote is transferred to the candidates
who are ranked lower on the voter's ballot in determining how
to fill the other two seats.
Consider, for instance, an election with four candidates
(Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Madison) running for three
seats on a board. Suppose that there are 100 voters-40 of
which prefer Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Madison, in
that order, 34 of which prefer Washington, Jefferson, Adams,
and Madison, in that order, and the other 26 of which prefer
Madison, Jefferson, Adams, and Washington, in that order.
Under the way that such an election has traditionally been
conducted in California, each voter would be able to vote for
up to three candidates. If all 100 voters voted for three of
their top choices, the ballot count in this election would be
as follows:
Adams: 100 votes
Jefferson: 100 votes
Washington: 74 votes
Madison: 26 votes
As such, Adams, Jefferson, and Washington would be elected.
Under CV, however, the election results would be very different.
Pursuant to this bill, the first round count would be as
follows:
Washington: 74
Madison: 26
Adams: 0
Jefferson: 0
The minimum number of votes necessary to be elected is based on
the following formula:
1+ (# of votes / (# of seats to be filled +1)) or, in this
case:
1+ (100/ (3+1)) = 1+ (100/4) = 1+25 = 26
In this case, both Washington and Madison have received at least
the minimum number of votes necessary to be elected (26).
Because Madison has exactly the minimum number of votes
necessary to be elected, all the ballots indicating Madison as
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the highest ranked candidate are put aside and the other
rankings are not examined.
Washington, on the other hand, has more than the minimum number
of votes necessary to be elected, so his surplus votes are
transferred at the appropriate transfer value to the other
candidates. The number of "surplus votes" to be transferred
is equal to the difference between the number of votes
received by Washington (74) and the minimum number of votes
needed to be elected (26), which is 48 votes. Those votes are
transferred at the transfer value, which is determined by the
following formula:
(# of surplus votes for Washington / total number of votes
received by Washington), or:
(48/74) = 0.6486
Of the 74 voters who ranked Washington first on their ballot, 40
preferred Adams second, and 34 preferred Jefferson second.
So, pursuant to the transfer value, those ballots are
transferred as follows:
40 ballots for Adams times the transfer value of 0.6486 =
25.9440 votes
34 ballots for Jefferson times the transfer value of 0.6486
= 22.0524 votes
Even though neither Adams nor Jefferson has the minimum number
of votes necessary to be elected (26 votes), because there are
only 2 candidates remaining, and because Adams has more votes
than Jefferson, Adams is elected. As such, the three
candidates elected to the board would be Washington, Madison,
and Adams.
In a sense, then, CV acts as a form of proportional
representation. In this case, a candidate who was the last
choice of 74 percent of the voters is elected because that
candidate was the first choice of the remaining 26 percent of
the voters. As a result, CV can allow a cohesive minority to
elect a candidate of their choice to a board at a multi-seat
election, even if the majority of voters are not inclined to
vote for that candidate.
8)Arguments in Support : According to the sponsor of this bill,
Californians for Electoral Reform:
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AB 1121 simply allows 10 cities or counties to use ranked
voting, but does not mandate that any jurisdictions use
these systems. In other words, this bill is strictly
permissive and not proscriptive. It empowers local elected
officials and voters in these cities and counties to do
what they know will work best for them. Because this
legislation only allows 10 cities or counties to use ranked
voting for a limited time period, and because voter
approval is required in order for these jurisdictions to
use ranked voting, this measure is extremely modest in
scope and low-risk. Furthermore, this legislation incurs
no cost to the state.
We believe Instant Runoff Voting provides significant
advantages over both plurality elections and two-round
runoff elections. IRV elects a candidate with the support
of the majority of voters in a single election. This saves
local governments a significant amount of money-upwards of
$1.6M per election for San Francisco alone. At the same
time, IRV increases voter turnout and also reduces negative
campaigning.
Choice voting, a ranked system like IRV but only for
legislative bodies, ensures that all constituencies achieve
fair representation, and also allows more voters to cast
effective votes, i.e. votes that actually help to elect
someone. It gives minority communities a chance to be
represented in areas where they traditionally have not
been.
9)Technical Issue : Page 3, line 32 of this bill provides that
RV may be authorized for a local jurisdiction by a charter
amendment, among other methods. However, another provision of
this bill limits the bill's application to general law (i.e.
non-charter) cities and counties only. To correct these
conflicting provisions, committee staff recommends the
following amendment:
On page 3, line 32, strike out "or charter amendment".
10)Previous Legislation : AB 1294 (Mullin) of 2007 would have
allowed any city, county, or district to conduct a local
election using RV. AB 1294 was vetoed by Governor
Schwarzenegger. In his veto message, the Governor wrote:
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This bill would allow cities and counties, subject to voter
approval, to conduct a local election using a ranked voting
system. This represents a drastic change to the way we
vote. Although there are some proponents for ranked
voting, which allows for so-called "instant runoff"
elections, I am concerned that we don't yet know enough
about how voters will react to such a dramatic change in
the way they vote. For instance, charter cities and
counties already have the right to hold ranked voting
elections, yet only one city has done so thus far, and that
was on a trial basis only.
Further, the machines necessary to implement ranked voting
are not widely available nor have any been certified by the
Secretary of State. As the Secretary of State recently
decertified the vast majority of electronic voting machines
used for traditional elections, it is premature to even
contemplate moving to ranked voting tomorrow until we have
resolved any issues with the machines needed for how we
vote today.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION :
Support
Californians for Electoral Reform (sponsor)
Asian Americans for Civil Rights and Equality
California Common Cause
CALPIRG
FairVote
League of California Cities
League of Women Voters of California
New America Foundation
Secretary of State Debra Bowen
Warren Slocum, Chief Elections Officer, San Mateo County
Opposition
None on file.
Analysis Prepared by : Ethan Jones / E. & R. / (916) 319-2094