Expanding recent efforts to become more involved in the handling of Pasadena Unified School District affairs, City Council members decided Monday to begin work on a ballot measure that would change the way Board of Education members are elected.

Under the current structure, school board candidates compete for one of seven seats that are, however, essentially shadow designations, as these seats do not correspond to any geographic constituency and are decided by all voters.

Councilwoman Joyce Streator proposed, and a majority of council members agreed, to let the voters decide in November if they would prefer to do away with seat numbers and elect board members entirely at large as early as next spring.

Some, including Councilman Victor Gordo, argued that a better move might be to keep numbered seats and assign a specific voter district to each seat — much like in council races — to make sure all parts of the community are represented.

“It would bring about some accountability. It would give our constituency at the very least a point of contact,” said Gordo.

City staff will draft a ballot measure to be approved by the council sometime before Aug. 11, the deadline for November’s election.

Though Streator’s proposal has majority support, abolishing seat numbers was billed as a temporary move while council members devise more permanent changes.

Council members will also decide by August how a seat-less at large election would work, with perhaps the most interesting idea for that coming from Board of Education member Mike Babcock, who asked the council to consider “preferential voting,” or, in other words, instant runoff voting.

A core issue of the California Green Party, the instant runoff voting method allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference rather than only choose one. If no candidate receives a majority of first-choice votes, the candidate with the least number of first-choice votes is eliminated and the second-choice votes marked on these ballots are transferred to the other candidates. The process continues until a candidate receives a majority of votes.

Last November, San Francisco County held an instant runoff election that increased voter turnout by 130,000 over the previous year at a taxpayer savings of $3 million, what it would have cost to hold a runoff election, reported the The Examiner. In February, San Diego City Council members formed a task force to investigate IRV, and the mayor of Burlington, Vt., was elected in March with an instant runoff ballot.