Voting Machines and Instant RunoffsBy Steve Abramson
Published December 4th 2005 in New York Times
To the Editor:
Your editorial about voting machines ("While We Weren't Looking," Nov. 13) was right on the money in every sense. Our voting rights must not be sacrificed to the lowest bidder, nor to the most influential lobby.
In 2001, Gov. George E. Pataki created the New York State Task Force on Election Modernization. The task force concluded that each county board of elections should be authorized to select and test its own preferred electronic voting system under the supervision of the state board. Currently, only Nassau, Suffolk and Monroe Counties own, maintain and control their own voting machines.
The New York State Citizens' Coalition on Help America Vote Act Implementation has requested that any machines selected in the state be capable of running software to both handle a ranked ballot and tabulate an instant runoff to produce a majority winner in multi-candidate races, an important issue on which the report was silent.
Steve Abramson
Southampton
The writer is director, Citizens for Instant Runoff Voting in New York State.
Your editorial about voting machines ("While We Weren't Looking," Nov. 13) was right on the money in every sense. Our voting rights must not be sacrificed to the lowest bidder, nor to the most influential lobby.
In 2001, Gov. George E. Pataki created the New York State Task Force on Election Modernization. The task force concluded that each county board of elections should be authorized to select and test its own preferred electronic voting system under the supervision of the state board. Currently, only Nassau, Suffolk and Monroe Counties own, maintain and control their own voting machines.
The New York State Citizens' Coalition on Help America Vote Act Implementation has requested that any machines selected in the state be capable of running software to both handle a ranked ballot and tabulate an instant runoff to produce a majority winner in multi-candidate races, an important issue on which the report was silent.
Steve Abramson
Southampton
The writer is director, Citizens for Instant Runoff Voting in New York State.
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.