By Catherine Richie
Published October 31st 2007 in StarNewsOnline.com
I enjoyed reading your Oct. 22 editorial supporting the common-sense proposal to replace two-round runoff elections with a single-round instant runoff.
Cary's success with instant runoff voting this month showed that there is every reason to believe that North Carolina voters would handle it well, boost majority rule and voter participation (and reduce) election costs and campaign spending.
The timing of your editorial was special for me as well. Oct. 22 was the day that I married David Richie several decades ago.
My husband died in 2002, but his legacy lives on. I think instant runoff voting will be one such legacy; he was a persuasive advocate for the idea in discussions with elected officials and letters to the Star-News.
Election Day '09 was a roller-coaster for election reformers. Instant runoff voting had a great night in Minnesota, where St. Paul voters chose to implement IRV for its city elections, and Minneapolis voters used IRV for the first time—with local media touting it as a big success. As the Star-Tribune noted in endorsing IRV for St. Paul, Tuesday’s elections give the Twin Cities a chance to show the whole state of Minnesota the benefits of adopting IRV. There were disappointments in Lowell and Pierce County too, but high-profile multi-candidate races in New Jersey and New York keep policymakers focused on ways to reform elections; the Baltimore Sun and Miami Herald were among many newspapers publishing commentary from FairVote board member and former presidential candidate John Anderson on how IRV can mitigate the problems of plurality elections.