Nov 1, 2009 5:19 pm US/Central
Minneapolis Voters Get 1st, 2nd And 3rd Choices
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) ―
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Under instant runoff voting, a candidate still wins if he or she gets 50 percent or more of first-choice votes. (File)
CBS
On Tuesday, Minneapolis voters will get their first taste of instant runoff voting.
That's the new voting system they approved in a citywide ballot in 2006. It asks voters to rank their top three choices in multi-candidate fields, which supporters say gives a boost to third-party candidates by allowing independent-minded voters to avoid picking "the lesser of two evils."
Under instant runoff voting, a candidate wins immediately if he or she gets 50 percent or more of first-choice rankings. If no one does, the last place candidate is eliminated and ballots cast for that candidate are counted for the next candidate on the ballot. These "instant runoffs" continue until one candidate reaches 50 percent.
Voters in St. Paul will decide on Tuesday if they want to implement the system in their city. It's already in use in San Francisco and in Burlington, Vermont.
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"What this did is it actually combined the primary and the general election into one event," said Mike Dean, a City of Minneapolis employee who led a workshop in October to teach voters how to use the new ballots.
Because the system is new, the votes will be hand counted. Still, preliminary results should be available right after the election.
(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
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