WHAT if an election were held and nobody showed - is it still democracy?

As of 6 p.m. on Election Day, only two voters had shown up at the Los Angeles polling station where I was a poll worker - out of the 1,073 registered at that precinct. In retrospect, the 27 voters who trickled in throughout the day during the March primary now seemed like a flood.

"What a waste of money," said one fellow poll worker, serving for the first time. "There must be a better way," said another, a 13-year polling-station veteran.

In fact, there is a better way, and it's gaining momentum across the country: Instant Runoff Voting.

Instant Runoff Voting allows voters to rank the candidates in their order of preference, 1-2-3, instead of just picking one candidate. If a candidate wins a majority of first rankings, the election is over, just like now. But if no candidate wins a majority of first rankings, voters' runoff rankings are used to determine the winner - instantly.

Under IRV, we can choose our leaders in one election instead of two. Voters and candidates could thus focus on a single election, and millions of tax dollars would be saved that are currently wasted on an unnecessary second election where few bother to participate.

We're not talking small change: Tuesday's election had a price tag of $5 million courtesy of Los Angeles taxpayers. And then there's the private, $4.3 million the two campaigns collectively spent in the Los Angeles school board race between incumbent Jon Lauritzen and challenger Tamar Galatzan.

IRV isn't a new idea. San Francisco has used it for three successful elections. Exit polls show that voters across all ethnic and racial lines like the system and find it easy to use.

In some races, Instant Runoff Voting has led to a decrease in negative campaigning, since candidates realize they may need second or third rankings from supporters of rival candidates in order to win. So instead of relying on nasty attack ads, some candidates are building coalitions and running more issue-based campaigns.

In November last year, 69 percent of voters in Oakland passed a measure to adopt IRV, joining voters in Davis, Berkeley and Santa Clara County. South Carolina, Louisiana and Arkansas also use IRV for their overseas military personnel who might otherwise not be able to cast a runoff ballot in time to be counted.

Here in Los Angeles, City Council members Jose Huizar and Eric Garcetti recently introduced a motion requesting that the chief legislative analyst and city clerk report to the City Council with an analysis of Instant Runoff Voting.

The motion will be considered at the June meeting of the council's Rules & Elections Committee. This is an important first step to answering a not-so-rhetorical question: "What happens when an election is held in Los Angeles and only 6 percent of voters show up?"

Lynne Serpe is deputy director of the Political Reform Program of New America Foundation. She is based in Los Angeles.