NY Instant Runoff Voting

Thanks to Ballot Access News for the idea for this post.

On June 4, 2010 the New York State Senate approved The Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) pilot program bill S3584B and a companion bill will be presented and is expected to be approved by the Assembly. The bill is not a mandate to enact IRV, but would allow all levels of government in the state to run pilot IRV elections. Election reform advocates point to this change as a major opportunity for small party candidates to exercise more influence at the polls.

On January 5, 2011 five New York Assembly members introduced A582. It provides for Instant Runoff Voting in New York city partisan primaries, and repeals the existing provision that requires run-off primaries several weeks after the first primary, if no one gets a majority. Also, seven New York State Senators have introduced S421, which would let any county or city use Instant Runoff Voting for its own local elections. The bill pertains to both general elections and partisan primaries.

I would like to see combining IRV with Open Primaries/Top Two.

What do you think of this idea?









NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote!

Michael H. Drucker
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2011 New York Election Law Bills

Thanks to Ballot Access News for this post.

On January 5, 2011, two interesting election law bills were introduced in the New York legislature. State Senator Joe Addabbo (D-Queens), chair of the Senate Elections Committee, introduced S609. It says that the names and party labels printed on ballots must be no smaller than 12 point type, and must be bold face. This bill is in response to complaints from voters that when the state switched from mechanical voting machines to paper ballots in 2010, the type was too small to be read easily.

The reason the type was so small in 2010 is that New York has another law saying the entire ballot must be on a single sheet of paper. As it was, the 2010 New York paper ballots were much larger than ballots in other states; they were 17 inches by 11 inches. It is not clear what will happen if S609 passes. Passage of S609 might prompt the state to abandon the rule that the entire ballot must be on a single sheet of paper. That, in turn, might prompt the state to give up the ballot format that uses either party columns or party rows.

Also on January 5, Assemblymember Rory Lancman (D-Queens) introduced A242. It says that candidates running in a primary must pay a $500 fee, at least seven days before the start of petitioning for primary candidates. If only one person pays the $500, then that candidate would not need to submit a petition to be on the primary ballot. The bill does not contain any provision for candidates who are unable to pay the fee. One wonders why A242 doesn’t just eliminate petitions, regardless of whether one person or multiple persons pay the fee. New York state has never had filing fees for candidates, and ever since primary elections came into existence, has required candidates running in a primary to submit petitions (except that no petitions are needed for candidates in the Republican presidential primary).

I am waiting for other changes like how will the Election Law handle overvotes when a voter picks the same candidate on two different party lines and how write-ins will count when the voter write-ins a candidate name that is also on a party line.









NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote!

Michael H. Drucker
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