(Presdient of the Miami Dade Branch of the NAACP Bishop Victor T. Curry)
The NAACP is advocating for some form of proportional representation (instead of districts or at large seats). I like the idea but it is almost impossible to explain because it comes in many forms.
According to Rob Richie and Steve Hill of the Center for Voting and Democracy,
"National groups recently endorsing proportional representation include the Sierra Club, US PIRG, Alliance for Democracy, and NOW, while state affiliates of Common Cause and the League of Women Voters support IRV legislation. The League of Women Voters is conducting national studies of voting system reform, as are four state League chapters. The NAACP, the ACLU, and other civil rights groups are studying alternative voting systems as a means to preserve minority representation in the upcoming round of redistricting."
Richie and Hill say about our form, Districts: Contrary to their reputation, single-seat districts don't represent geographic interests very well.
In a nutshell with proportional voting:
1. You decide which candidates you would like to see elected.
2. You rank those candidates in order of preference -- knowing that a lower choice will never hurt the chances of a higher choice.
That's it! Your vote will be counted toward the highest candidate on your ranked list who can be helped by your vote. As many people as mathematically possible will elect one person -- most voters will help elect one of their top two choices.
This is what Brad Brown of the NAACP said about this subject at the Charter Review Meeting on August 15th:
"There are a plethora of issues related to possible revisions of the Miami-Dade Charter but none more important than achieving solid citizen representation on the Board of County Commissioners. Suggestions have been floated to add at large commissioners under the theory that districts representation is not effective in looking at county wide needs. (Think of how this logic would apply to our current Federal system with district and state representatives asked to vote on national wide issues like national security). At large elections have been seen to lead to a tyranny of the majority and thus have often lost in court under voting rights law challenges to district elections. District elections themselves have problems. While they may provide minority representation and ensure neglected areas can have a voice, demographics are not a constant. The appeal of members of the Haitian community for changes in the number of commissioners is a testament to this reality. Changing districts specifically to ensure minority representation can run into constitutional challenges.
There is however an alternative that has proven itself around the world. It is proportional voting. There are a number of forms that this can take and one or another form is used in 21 of the 28 countries in Europe. It is found throughout the world in numerous other countries such as Australia, Israel, South Africa, and Brazil. It has been credited with being a significant factor in stopping the violence and achieving peace between Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland as it helped ensure that everyone felt represented. The possibilities for representation in proportional voting leads to much better voting turn outs in the 75 to 90% range in contrast to the U.S. where turnout is usually less than 50%.
In the United States an good example is the City of Cambridge Massachusetts which established a form of proportional voting in 1941 in order to create opportunities for Black representation on the city council and it has been successful for over 65 years. Proportional voting offers an opportunity for minority representation and allows members of such a group to feel represented no matter where they live but it is not focused on a criteria such as race or ethnicity as is often districting. In reality it is common interest groups that define themselves, the candidates they run and who they vote for. While race and ethnicity often are seen as shaping a common interest, persons concerned about an issue like affordable housing, water supply etc can coalesce throughout the voting area and have an excellent opportunity of gaining a voice on the governing body.
I urge the Taskforce to think out of the box and review voting alternatives that not only will provide for representation that would encourage larger turnouts, and fairer representation today but would continue to do that as the population changes and areas where people live shift and groups defined by common interests change."
8 comments:
Would this take care all the seats? :-)
I think proportional voting would be great. I'd still like to see some commissioners elected at large to balance out the body. Let's say 11-15 commissioners elected proportionally, and 3-5 elected at large.
How about 5-6 commissiners elected to districts and 4-5 elected county wide?
13 is too many.
Think of it this way: maybe 13 isn't "enough". If you look around the world, local representative bodies tend to have much lower representative-to-population ratios.
Within London, for example, each council ("municipality") may have as many as 60 members representing a geographic area with no more than 300,000 people. That's 1 member per 5000 residents.
Same for Tokyo. In Shinjuku, one of Tokyo's 23 special wards, 38 council members are elected to represent the 309,000 residents within that ward, or about 1 member per 8131 residents.
Compare that to our ~173,000:1. I'm not suggesting we should go that route, but it's an interesting comparison nonetheless.
What about the LA supervisors, 1 to 1.5 million? On PR I think that RCV or ranked choice voting is the best, as San Francisco has put in place. There you can rank the canadates by how much you hate or dislike them, with the largest vote winners getting elected.
The situation with the L.A. County Board of Supervisors is a bizarre and ridiculous anomaly. It stems primarily from the fact that California law generally restricts county boards of supervisors to exactly 5 members (except San Francisco, which is consolidated with the city). Texas does the same thing -- only 5 members on a Commissioners Court. In California they used to just split counties up into smaller areas when they reached a certain population, but today that would be harder because of the political ramifications, and all the crazy accounting you'd have to do to set up the new county (transfer debt, assets, etc.), etc.
Miami-Dade County Commission system does not work because we have too many commisioners who have too many conflicts and most of the commissioners are just too dumb to find solutions to problems.
We need less commissioners.
I thought IRV was supposed to be fairer, and ensure that it would elect candidates who more truly represented the public.
But there's this recent phenomenon of Black flight from IRV haven San Francisco:
"San Francisco hopes to reverse black flight"
By John Ritter, USA TODAY
August 26, 2007
SAN FRANCISCO — Wayne Cooksey joined the flight of African-Americans from this city last year to escape soaring rents and buy a home. Michael Higgenbotham left six years ago for a safer neighborhood and better schools for his three children. Adell Adams retired and wanted to downsize but knew her home's equity wouldn't go far in a market where decent condos start at $500,000.
Aubrey Lewis was among the first to go, to nearby Oakland in 1977. "We left because of the housing situation," says Lewis, 77. "And that was early. It hasn't gotten much better."
African-Americans are abandoning this famously progressive city at a rate that has alarmed San Francisco officials, who vow to stop the exodus and develop a strategy to win blacks back to the city. In June, Mayor Gavin Newsom appointed a task force to study how to reverse decades of policies — and neglect — that black leaders say have fueled the flight.
Black flight can alter a city's character. "It's important for a city's future that it be a diverse place, and San Francisco is drifting toward being an upper-middle-class city," says Ed Blakely, director of Katrina recovery for New Orleans.
According to Census estimates, the number of blacks here shrank from 13.4% of the population in 1970 to just 6.5% in 2005 — the biggest percentage decline in any major American city
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-08-26-urban-blacks_N.htm
So if IRV is supposed to ensure fairer representation, then would you say it is working?
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