It is my sad duty to report on some of the developments the Pierce County GOP and Democratic Party have begun involving themselves in. As politically aware residents know, RCV (Ranked Choice Voting) was implemented for the first time this past November in Pierce County elections. It was fervently opposed by both our local Democratic and Republican Party’s but when the issue was put on the ballot the will of the people proved in favor of the system. Since then, the Parties’ complaints have been endless.
This Friday, February 6, 2009, the League of Woman Voters is planning a forum on RCV at the University of Puget Sound (6:00 PM, Wheelock Student Center) and at least the Democrats (most likely the Republicans too) are already mustering out their volunteers to see that “their voices are heard” – specifically that they are heard by certain influential members of the county Charter Review Commission.
To quote Pierce County Democratic Chair, Nathe Lawver.
Though the party has not taken an official vote on the issue, it is apparent that the experiment in our electoral system failed. All the promises of the promoters saw opposite results. There was a 20 percent undervote in key county-wide races (they said more people would participate); it was to be less expensive (even future costs without start-up are projected to be larger than running just a primary); and there are other reasons, too.
It pains me to see fellow Democrats twist facts in order to reveal the underlying truth. On the one hand, Nathe is correct: RCV is a bad idea which is why I voted against it in 2006. My concern then, as now, is that RCV improves the chances of fringe radicals like Robert Hill, Will Baker, and now our County Treasure, Dale Washam, thereby undermining the genius of a two-party system which (in theory) is supposed to be a check on radicalism and a bulwark of moderate, manageable, change (similar to that which Barack Obama appears to offer).
But on the other hand, when Nathe says, “There was a 20 percent under vote in key county-wide races (they said more people would participate)” he’s sorta misleading his readers. The reason I say that is because – while it is true that many people did not fully understand the RCV system – there were many more who simply refused to participate either out of protest or, as I personally believe, to discredit the electoral system for post-election review. In fact, on several occasions I witnessed prominent individuals in my own party personally encourage fellow voters and party members not to rank the candidates past the Democratic roster or even past their personal favorite candidate. While I can’t claim their actions account for a 20% reduction in participation, I don’t find it hard to believe that other like-minded individuals simply refused to participate either to protest the system (despite the fact that it was put in place by the majority) or because they simply had neither a second nor third choice candidate.
Please do not misunderstand, I’m all for getting rid of RCV. But let’s go about doing this democratically by putting the issue back on the ballot for the people to decide – influencing them with untainted facts about the system and its results.
We were pleased to hear that we would have the opportunity to sit down with three fantastic authorities on voting reform. 
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