San Francisco Bay Guardian
On the
move: IRV election reform finally makes some moves toward the
November ballot By Steven T. Jones June 11,
2003
After languishing in limbo for many months - and in the process,
making San Francisco elections officials nervous -plans to implement
instant-runoff voting for the November election have taken some
significant steps forward in June. While still racing against the
clock and facing opposition from the city's political power brokers
(see "The Machine Attacks IRV," 5/28/03), vendor Election Systems
and Software finally submitted its plan June 2 for a computer-based
voting system for state and federal approval. That development was
followed two days later by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors'
Finance and Audit Committee unanimously approving a $2.3 million
allocation to implement the new system. The full board is slated to
take up the item June 10, after our press time, and IRV supporters
are confident there are six votes to pass it, and maybe even the
eight votes that would be needed to override a possible mayoral
veto. "This process has taken a great leap forward this week," said
Jon Golinger of the Center for Voting and Democracy, which has
pushed hard for IRV's implementation since voters approved Measure A
last year, thus amending the City Charter to create elections in
which voters rank their top three choices of candidates. Sources
also tell us that contract negotiations between the city and
ES&S are complete and that the contract will be signed as soon
as the full board approves the funding, which could be finalized
June 17. Attention now turns to the Secretary of State's Office,
which is reviewing both the plan for computerized counting and a
fallback plan of hand counting ballots that had been submitted
earlier. "The proposals are under review, and they will need to be
tested," Terri Carbaugh, assistant secretary of state for
communications, told us. Those proposals could go before the
office's Voting Systems Panel for approval as soon as the end of the
month, but the hand-count method is being actively challenged by a
coalition of San Franciscans with ties to Mayor Willie Brown. The
coalition's lawyer, Karen Getman, claims the hand count will
disenfranchise minority voters. She told us the group hasn't decided
whether it will actively challenge the computerized IRV count as
well. The conventional wisdom around San Francisco is that
supporters of mayoral candidate Gavin Newsom, including the Brown
political machine, will try to stop IRV from being implemented this
year because of fears it will help progressive mayoral candidates
Tom Ammiano and Angela Alioto, who might otherwise split the left
vote. The Center for Voting and Democracy has also vowed to sue if
IRV is not implemented this year as required by Measure A. "I know this commission is going
to be sued whether we implement it or not," said Alix Rosenthal,
chair of the city's Elections Commission. "The most legally
defensible thing is to do whatever is possible to make sure this
happens in November." |