The Senate Subcommittee on Elections, chaired by Senator Dan Larson, held a hearing on Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) on November 20th. The purpose of the hearing was to educate committee members and the public about Ranked Choice Voting. Legislation for the adoption of statewide rules on RCV elections may be introduced in the 2008 session.

Testimony included the following:

* Jeanne Massey, FairVote Minnesota
* John Gilbert, Chair of the Wake County (North Carolina) Board of Elections
* Council Member Betsy Hodges and Elections Director Cindy Reichert, City of Minneapolis
* Beth Fraser, Director of Governmental Affairs, Office of the MN Secretary of State
* Fran Hesch, City of Hopkins resident
* Joe Mansky, Ramsey County Elections Director
* Andy Cilek, Minnesota Voters Alliance
* John Hottinger, Saint Paul resident and former Minnesota Senate Majority Leader

Additional written testimony was submitted by Richard DeLeon, Political Science Professor, San Francisco State University; George McGovern, Auditor for state and federal elections in Cambridge; and Terrill Bouricius, former Burlington City Council Member and Vermont State Legislator.

Senate Subcommittee members present were Dan Larson (Chair), Chris Gerlach, Joe Gimse and Sandy Pappas. Senators John Marty and Ann Rest were not able to attend.

Below are some highlights of the hearing. You can also watch it here.

Jeanne Massey began with an overview of Ranked Choice Voting in Minnesota.

John Gilbert, the Chair of the Wake County Elections Board in North Carolina, followed with highlights of the successful first-time use of Ranked Choice Voting in Cary and Hendersonville, North Carolina, in the recent 2007 elections.  Exit polls show that voters in both cities like the new way of voting and found it easy to use.

Minneapolis Council Member Betsy Hodges explained the process Minneapolis City Council used to put RCV on the ballot in 2006 and noted that that learning curve for Minneaoplis voters wasn't as steep as she thought it would be. The voters passed the ballot measure by 65%.

Minneapolis Elections Director, Cindy Reichert, provided an overview of the RCV implementation process and challenges in Minneapolis. The City is working with the statewide RCV taskforce to develop rules and procedures for RCV elections and is reviewing equipment options for Minneapolis implementation. She said that the city is working towards a 2009 implementation timeline, but that the city could choose to delay implementation if the system for conducting the election isn't in place by then.

Ramsey County Elections Director, Joe Mansky, spoke to implementation challenges in Ramsey County, should it be adopted in Saint Paul or elsewhere. He identified several implementation issues, most of which are being addressed by the statewide RCV Issues Group. Taking these issues into consideration, he said that implementing RCV in Ramsey County would be feasible by 2011.

Beth Fraser spoke briefly to the efforts of Secretary of State's office in convening the RCV Issues Group to develop state standards for RCV elections.

Fran Hesch spoke to the long-time effort in Hopkins to study and consider RCV for multi-seat elections, similar to the approach recently used in Hendersonville, North Carolina.

Andy Cilek, with the Minnesota Voters Alliance, spoke in opposition to RCV. He represents an interest group which aims to bring back partisan primaries in municipal elections. He announced that the group intends to submit a legal challenge to RCV on the grounds that it gives some voters more than one vote and is unconstitutional. While the use of the Bucklin method in Minnesota nearly 100 years ago was found unconstitutional on these grounds, Single Transferable (including its single-seat subset, Instant Runoff Voting) is a different voting method and has been upheld twice in the courts as perserving the constitutional principle of "one-person, one-vote". Click here for additional information.

John Hottinger testified last and had the opportunity to correct some of the misstatements made by Andy Cilek. He closed the session with an impassioned speech about the importance of Ranked Choice Voting for the betterment of democracy. His comments were taken from his unpublished op-ed.

Click here to see the Pioneer Press coverage of the hearing.

Contact Jeanne Massey at jeanne.massey@fairvotemn.org if you have any questions about the hearing.