“The voting machine will now take 10%, the surplus percentage, from the vote of every voter who chose that candidate as their first choice, and apply it to the next choice on each voter's ballot.”
Not quite. If the “voting machine” takes away 10% of the candidate’s first choice votes, she’ll have 99 votes remaining, which is less than the threshold of 100.
Thanks for this tutorial, but I'm raising my hand here. Please call on me! Okay, thank you.
I have a question and, if I'm allowed, a comment, no a concern, well, anyway, a criticism.
First, my question.
My question has to do with the sequence for shifting votes in the proposed election scheme for council members. The sequence matters. When, not how, is a question that has yet to be even asked.
Let me explain.
It's not that we'll see votes transferred from eliminated candidates before we see surplus votes shifted from winning candidates, as some of the scenarios in the videos show. Most likely, we'll see votes shifted from winning candidates before we'll see votes shifted from losing candidates. And, if both were to occur at the same time, it will still leave votes for the rest of the still-viable candidates frozen in place, while the second choices of those who voted for the winning candidate, and, depending on the sequence, the second choice of voters who voted for the eliminated candidate, enter the tally. This seems to me to give more voting power to those who back winners (and in some cases, those who voted for the least popular candidate) in Round 2 of the tallying. Whose votes are counted when matters, especially when the total votes are declining and the 25%+1 threshold is declining as a result. Those who vote for Round 1 winners will have their votes count earlier and more often than those who vote for lagging candidates.
This is not just a math problem, it is likely to be a real world problem. More often than not, I think that Round 1 will produce at least one 25%+1 winner. Looking at recent primary election results in council races, that seems to be a common result, even in large fields. So, in that case, the transfer of fractional surplus votes will occur before any candidate is eliminated. If that's the case, then Round 2 will involve a tally in which only the fractionalized second choice votes of the winning candidate are counted, not the second choice votes of any other candidate. If the elimination of the lowest-vote getting candidate occurs at the same time as the transfer of partial votes from the winning candidate's ballot, that would seem anomalous, because how will you know if that candidate has the lowest vote count if you haven't yet tallied those surplus votes? So the sequence that is most likely to be followed will produce in many, if not most cases, a Round 2 tally in which the winning candidate's voters are given more clout than those who votes for lagging candidates.
The questions to be answered are not just how the fractionalizing and transferring of surplus votes will be accomplished, which you say is anyone's guess or more likely the guess of the advocate you quote, but in what sequence they will occur. From the winners first in Round 1, or from both the winners and the biggest losers at the same time. Both are problematic (for the candidates who have to compete in Round 2 or later Rounds), but the latter is more problematic than the former (because of how it treats the biggest loser).
So much for the wonky stuff. If I still have the floor, may I add a comment? Thank you.
I'm sure both the Fair Vote and Democracy Rising advocates mean well. But, are they paying attention to what is happening all around them when it comes to suspicions and mistrust of our elections? Yes, those suspicions are crazy and the mistrust is unwarranted. But that's what we're dealing with now. So how will it help to improve trust in our elections to move to a more complicated and less transparent vote counting system?
You quote Maria Perez of Democracy Rising as follows:
"Voters need to know that there's an election coming up, what the ballot is going to look like, and how you fill it out. More engaged voters might want to dive deeper into the math of it, and they certainly can, but most voters will just want to make sure their vote matters and counts."
No, it's not filling out the ballot that's an issue for suspicious and mistrustful voters, it's how what they fill out is counted. Deferring to computers won't assuage them, especially those engaged voters who take an interest in how their votes are counted and whose eyes will glaze over at the explanation. And then telling them that the votes of some candidates will be moved to other candidates is guaranteed to exacerbate their suspicions.
Okay. I've used up my time. There are a lot of other hands going up now. I hope you can get to their questions and concerns as well.
You make some fair points here relating to sequencing in STV and distrust that can come with complexity. But I can’t help to wonder if they really matter. If STV does create biases for voters that choose winner or looser candidates they would seem quite small (and potentially self-cancelling) in the context of an overall system that better represents the electorate. They would certainly seem small relative to the current winner-take-all voting system of 50%+1.
Your concerns about complexity and the more difficult (although not lacking) transparency becoming a source of voter distrust seem similarly misplaced. Is a more complex but more representative voting system likely to contribute significant change in voter distrust? How do we weigh this in the context of a whole host of other arguably more significant factors for rising distrust, such as increasing isolation, fraying of social networks, weakening of civic institutions or more directly the concentration and obfuscation of how campaigns are financed? And isn’t a lot of the distrust and doubt around elections in the current moment spread by those who just don’t like more democratic outcomes? In that context will the distrust many people feel really be exacerbated as result of adopting a voting system that is better at representing everyone? And is the status quo voting system really more conducive to preserving trust?
I find some critics of Measure 26-228 suspiciously obsessed with minutiae or nitpicking parts rather than assessing the charter Commission’s proposal as a comprehensive whole. Of course the details are important. Rose City Reform is doing a great service in that regard. But these details and the small contingencies in implementation of a more participatory and equitable voting system need to be kept in a reasonable perspective. -Jim Labbe
Thanks for your response. I appreciate a thoughtful exchange.
I agree that the minutia of the voting processes are less important than the system they create. But that is my larger concern -- that the new Council, as proposed, will be more fractured, more focused on single issue constituencies, and less able to come together to meet the needs of he city as a whole. We're likely to see more debate and less timely responses to the urgent issues the city faces today -- which, as we've seen with the homeless problem, means those problems become worse, more entrenched and more intractable. The time value of efficiency matters at all levels of government, especially in a city.
Back to the minutia: You're right that some of the effects of the STV process will be self-cancelling, but only if Round 1 winners are rare and subsequent rounds of voting become the norm. In Round 1, candidates who appeal to single-issue constituencies will have their bast shot at winning via the 25% threshold, while those who gain larger shares of the Round 1 votes will, via vote transfers, have a larger impact in subsequent rounds.
We probably agree on much of what is in the Charter revision -- taking the Council out of the business of running bureaus, district elections and representation, switching to a single November election with instant runoff RCV. But the minutia we're talking about here not only complicate the package but will undermine its best purposes.
My earliest criticism of the package was that it was a package, when voters deserved to vote separately on its big pieces, beginning with the changes in elections. Voters should get to vote, separately, on how their votes will be counted.
“The voting machine will now take 10%, the surplus percentage, from the vote of every voter who chose that candidate as their first choice, and apply it to the next choice on each voter's ballot.”
Not quite. If the “voting machine” takes away 10% of the candidate’s first choice votes, she’ll have 99 votes remaining, which is less than the threshold of 100.
Thanks for this tutorial, but I'm raising my hand here. Please call on me! Okay, thank you.
I have a question and, if I'm allowed, a comment, no a concern, well, anyway, a criticism.
First, my question.
My question has to do with the sequence for shifting votes in the proposed election scheme for council members. The sequence matters. When, not how, is a question that has yet to be even asked.
Let me explain.
It's not that we'll see votes transferred from eliminated candidates before we see surplus votes shifted from winning candidates, as some of the scenarios in the videos show. Most likely, we'll see votes shifted from winning candidates before we'll see votes shifted from losing candidates. And, if both were to occur at the same time, it will still leave votes for the rest of the still-viable candidates frozen in place, while the second choices of those who voted for the winning candidate, and, depending on the sequence, the second choice of voters who voted for the eliminated candidate, enter the tally. This seems to me to give more voting power to those who back winners (and in some cases, those who voted for the least popular candidate) in Round 2 of the tallying. Whose votes are counted when matters, especially when the total votes are declining and the 25%+1 threshold is declining as a result. Those who vote for Round 1 winners will have their votes count earlier and more often than those who vote for lagging candidates.
This is not just a math problem, it is likely to be a real world problem. More often than not, I think that Round 1 will produce at least one 25%+1 winner. Looking at recent primary election results in council races, that seems to be a common result, even in large fields. So, in that case, the transfer of fractional surplus votes will occur before any candidate is eliminated. If that's the case, then Round 2 will involve a tally in which only the fractionalized second choice votes of the winning candidate are counted, not the second choice votes of any other candidate. If the elimination of the lowest-vote getting candidate occurs at the same time as the transfer of partial votes from the winning candidate's ballot, that would seem anomalous, because how will you know if that candidate has the lowest vote count if you haven't yet tallied those surplus votes? So the sequence that is most likely to be followed will produce in many, if not most cases, a Round 2 tally in which the winning candidate's voters are given more clout than those who votes for lagging candidates.
The questions to be answered are not just how the fractionalizing and transferring of surplus votes will be accomplished, which you say is anyone's guess or more likely the guess of the advocate you quote, but in what sequence they will occur. From the winners first in Round 1, or from both the winners and the biggest losers at the same time. Both are problematic (for the candidates who have to compete in Round 2 or later Rounds), but the latter is more problematic than the former (because of how it treats the biggest loser).
So much for the wonky stuff. If I still have the floor, may I add a comment? Thank you.
I'm sure both the Fair Vote and Democracy Rising advocates mean well. But, are they paying attention to what is happening all around them when it comes to suspicions and mistrust of our elections? Yes, those suspicions are crazy and the mistrust is unwarranted. But that's what we're dealing with now. So how will it help to improve trust in our elections to move to a more complicated and less transparent vote counting system?
You quote Maria Perez of Democracy Rising as follows:
"Voters need to know that there's an election coming up, what the ballot is going to look like, and how you fill it out. More engaged voters might want to dive deeper into the math of it, and they certainly can, but most voters will just want to make sure their vote matters and counts."
No, it's not filling out the ballot that's an issue for suspicious and mistrustful voters, it's how what they fill out is counted. Deferring to computers won't assuage them, especially those engaged voters who take an interest in how their votes are counted and whose eyes will glaze over at the explanation. And then telling them that the votes of some candidates will be moved to other candidates is guaranteed to exacerbate their suspicions.
Okay. I've used up my time. There are a lot of other hands going up now. I hope you can get to their questions and concerns as well.
You make some fair points here relating to sequencing in STV and distrust that can come with complexity. But I can’t help to wonder if they really matter. If STV does create biases for voters that choose winner or looser candidates they would seem quite small (and potentially self-cancelling) in the context of an overall system that better represents the electorate. They would certainly seem small relative to the current winner-take-all voting system of 50%+1.
Your concerns about complexity and the more difficult (although not lacking) transparency becoming a source of voter distrust seem similarly misplaced. Is a more complex but more representative voting system likely to contribute significant change in voter distrust? How do we weigh this in the context of a whole host of other arguably more significant factors for rising distrust, such as increasing isolation, fraying of social networks, weakening of civic institutions or more directly the concentration and obfuscation of how campaigns are financed? And isn’t a lot of the distrust and doubt around elections in the current moment spread by those who just don’t like more democratic outcomes? In that context will the distrust many people feel really be exacerbated as result of adopting a voting system that is better at representing everyone? And is the status quo voting system really more conducive to preserving trust?
I find some critics of Measure 26-228 suspiciously obsessed with minutiae or nitpicking parts rather than assessing the charter Commission’s proposal as a comprehensive whole. Of course the details are important. Rose City Reform is doing a great service in that regard. But these details and the small contingencies in implementation of a more participatory and equitable voting system need to be kept in a reasonable perspective. -Jim Labbe
Thanks for your response. I appreciate a thoughtful exchange.
I agree that the minutia of the voting processes are less important than the system they create. But that is my larger concern -- that the new Council, as proposed, will be more fractured, more focused on single issue constituencies, and less able to come together to meet the needs of he city as a whole. We're likely to see more debate and less timely responses to the urgent issues the city faces today -- which, as we've seen with the homeless problem, means those problems become worse, more entrenched and more intractable. The time value of efficiency matters at all levels of government, especially in a city.
Back to the minutia: You're right that some of the effects of the STV process will be self-cancelling, but only if Round 1 winners are rare and subsequent rounds of voting become the norm. In Round 1, candidates who appeal to single-issue constituencies will have their bast shot at winning via the 25% threshold, while those who gain larger shares of the Round 1 votes will, via vote transfers, have a larger impact in subsequent rounds.
We probably agree on much of what is in the Charter revision -- taking the Council out of the business of running bureaus, district elections and representation, switching to a single November election with instant runoff RCV. But the minutia we're talking about here not only complicate the package but will undermine its best purposes.
My earliest criticism of the package was that it was a package, when voters deserved to vote separately on its big pieces, beginning with the changes in elections. Voters should get to vote, separately, on how their votes will be counted.