Joe Kirby notes that Rapid City’s new mayor-electJason Salamun fell well short of a strong mandate to lead South Dakota’s second-largest city in last week’s election:
Rapid City elected a new mayor this week from a field of five candidates. I wish incoming Mayor Jason Salamun the best. However, it is important to note that he enters office with only 32% of the vote; two thirds of voters picked someone else. This outcome exposes the shortcomings of the voting system used for the election [Joe Kirby, “Does Rapid City’s New Mayor Have a Mandate?” Sioux Falls Joe, 2023.06.09].
Kirby is a well-known advocate of ranked-choice voting, also known as instant-runoff voting. but he also notes a perhaps easier voting innovation, approval voting. While ranked-choice voting requires putting the candidates in some order of preference, approval voting just asks voters to mark every candidate whom they find tolerable. The winner is the person with the most approval marks. Kirby sees advantages to this literal popularity contest:
Approval voting better captures the intent of voters and ensures that popular candidates win. With approval voting, each voter may choose (approve) any number of candidates, and the winner is the one approved by the largest number of voters. Ultimately, the winner is both popular and likely to beat all rivals head-to-head.
Candidates are rewarded for appealing to a wide swath of the electorate. They tend to attack less and collaborate more. More candidates seem to run. Candidates who alienate some segment of the population likely may struggle. And approval voting eliminates the spoiler effect that plagues plurality voting [Kirby, 2023.06.09].
Kirby notes that Fargo used approval voting to pick its mayor in 2022. North Dakota’s Legislature tried to ban approval voting this year, but the Senate failed to override Governor Doug Burgum’s veto in April. South Dakota’s Legislature banned ranked-choice voting in the 2023 Session (see 2023 Senate Bill 55), but the that bill’s language does not appear to ban approval voting.
Rank Choice Voting does not work in South Dakota, as it violates current law related to governing over elections due to the fact that if no one gets a majority of votes during the election, ‘we’ have create a time, place, and manner of holding a second election of a # of candidates receiving the most popular votes (usually the top 3 candidates).
Approval Voting so far, has been ruled a such, by the Attorney General’s Office, that it does not violate current law, as it still requires the fact, that still have to hold a second vote to confirm the true result of the election, which allows us to establish time, place, manner of such election. IT simply allows you to vote for more than one candidate, however, if no one receives more than 50% +1, a run off election is required.
I do not support either of the two choices. STick to paper ballots, vote for one person, only rule.
That Republicans are afraid of democracy is hardly surprising. Brookings, Vermilion and Yankton would be perfect test beds.
https://www.kvrr.com/2023/04/19/fargos-approval-voting-system-lives-on-after-state-senate-fails-to-override-veto/
It might work in Spearditch, too.
When I lived in Rapid, city races required 50%+1. If no one got that at the first election, there was a runoff. They must have changed it since I lived there. The school district races were decided by the top vote getter, no matter if that person got less than 50%+1. Usually in the 1990s, city and school elections were held together to save money. It seems they have again split the city and school elections.
My view is everyone should have to get a minimum of 50%+1. I don’t care if it by ranked choice balloting, approval voting, or two elections. I think you get more turnout with a single election.
Damn straight, I fear a DEMOCRACY, that’s why we do not have a direct democracy here. It’s a representative form where we elect peoppe to hold meetings in public to discuss public issues to adopt resolutions, initiatives, candidates, etc…
It’s important to remember the Electoral College installed Donald Trump.
Mike, not to project, but I’m sure you feel more satisfaction with your elected officials than one who does not see him/herself reflected in the policies of those officials. The question becomes then: you are typical? Are the views of you and the elected officials representative of the majority? That a system has been created with so many steps to separate the majority from the decision making process is the indictment of the system — not the praise of that system for/by the minority.
South Dakota Liberals ~ Aren’t you proud to be among the dominant political group in America? We’re proud to have you.
Living in SD it’s easy to forget that only 40% of our country votes the way 70% of South Dakota votes.
Um, Mike? The current law banning RCV, SB 55, isn’t even law yet; it doesn’t take effect until the end of this month.
Ranked choice voting would work just fine, if Republicans weren’t standing in the way of new ideas to preserve their minoritarian rule. Republicans realize they can’t win a fair fight, and they don’t want any system like RCV that would defuse the electoral gaming that results in things like the last two Republican Presidents taking power despite failing to win the popular vote.
Most of all, like Mike Z, Republicans fear democracy, because they know they will lose more often than they win in true democratic votes.
P.Aitch, I’m still not sure what I would do with myself if I found myself belonging to a dominant political group… probably break off and form a new opposition party.
Ranked choice voting may be too complicated for your average South Dakota voter to comprehend. They have enough problems just keeping their votes in one Republican column.
@Cory – Don’t know if you’re trying to be funny or sarcastic or you are just saturated with negativity.
I suspect you’ll keep your intentions secret, though.
Yeah, it was pretty obvious if there was a runoff or approval voting in the RC election, Armstrong would have won.
Mr. E, do you agree with Mr. Zitterich and grudznick that a representative democracy is the best way? I feel you do, when I read your blogging place. You just don’t like the fellows who are elected to represent you, and don’t like the way they carry out their bidness at the councils of the town, right?
Yes, you are correct, the law that bans Rank Choice goes into effect on July 1st, have you heard anyone attempting to petition or challenge the law? If not, the whole people of the state, all 887,000 people would be governed as such, meaning Rank Choice is officially banned.
The PEOPLE do not want rank choice, and this was a huge topic of concern in a large majority of counties, county and precinct committees discussed this fact many times, and as I went and talked to people in my precinct, only 2 of every 10 people I spoke to even supported it. It was not a republican issue, this was an entire county issue, and there are democrats in each precinct, and knowing, that Democrats make up problly 50% of my precinct, I assume I spoke to many democrats as well. I am not speaking for all Democrats, just those I speak to.
Of all the peope I spoke to the greatest concern the voters had was the possible manipulation of ballots by political parties.
I really do not think the South Dakota People do not want to get away from Paper Ballots, the more popular Voting for 1 person per district, etc. and that is a belief system we have in our beloved State. National interests are trying to push this rank choice voting, mostly cuase they can easily manipulate it greatly.
The person who wins the most votes should be President, the person who gets the second most votes should be Vice President. Period.
Rank choice is prevalent in South Duhkota and other red states. Your choices for pols is ranker than Goatzilla’s imaginary stinking goat herd and always will be until you have some actual real choices for every office.
Quite funny, Mike Z , Those who sit around in political county and precinct committees are about .00001% of the voting public. That is far, far too small a sample size to get statistical significance, let alone a random sample. How WE, THE PEOPLE feel about anything is not up to you and your little rump group to decide. Yes, people could refer that law to a vote. My guess is people don’t care that much about which system is used, as long as their vote is counted. You and I probably agree that ranked choice voting is too complex for people to trust. So, it’s just not going to happen statewide. I think, however, that it would be nice to try it out in a couple communities, just to see.
This is yet another indicator that the SDGOP is splitting itself into its two factions: a pragmatic center and a far white wing committed to blowing it all up.