Charlotteville City Council voted Tuesday to allow ranked choice voting in nomination elections for city council races.
The measure passed on a vote of 4-1. Mayor Juandiego Wade and Councilors Natalie Oschrin, Michael Payne, and Brian Pinkston voted in support, and Councilor Lloyd Snook voted against.
In 2020, the General Assembly and Governor Ralph Northam approved the optional use of RCV voting in elections for city and county governing bodies until July 1, 2031.
RCV allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference. If a candidate is the first choice of more than half the voters, that candidate wins the election. However, if no candidate gets the majority of the vote, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated. The second-choice votes for the eliminated candidate are then redistributed, and this process continues until a candidate wins more than half of the vote.
Arlington County is the only other locality that allows for RCV, which they began in 2023.
“Ranked choice voting has been successfully adopted in various localities and states across the nation and has been shown by research to support more diverse candidate pools and improved civility in campaigns and elections,” City Registrar Taylor Yowell wrote in a memo to city council.
Former Del. Sally Hudson, D-Charlotteville, the author of the 2020 law allowing for RCV in local elections, applauded the passage.
“This step has been years in the making, and Charlottesville can be proud we’re doing our part to make democracy better for the long haul.”
Hudson recently founded Ranked Choice Virginia, a non-partisan, non-profit venture focused on bringing ranked-choice voting to Virginia.
UpVote Virginia also applauded Charlottesville City Council for their approval.
“We applaud Charlottesville for, once again, being on the forefront of democracy,” said Liz White, the executive director of UpVote Virginia. “This vote, taken after careful and thorough consideration, indicates a willingness to step up for voters even when change seems a little scary. UpVote is looking forward to engaging with the public to make sure the promise of RCV is realized and the policy becomes a permanent part of Charlottesville’s elections.”
Gov. Glenn Youngkin vetoed legislation passed by the General Assembly earlier this year that would have codified parts of the legal process in RCV across Virginia. The bill was intended to address concerns from the Department of Elections about the RCV system already in place for localities to use.
Youngkin cited confusion in the process for voters as his reason for the veto, but Sen. Schuyler VanValkenburg, D-Henrico, said the Department of Elections asked for the specific aspects of this bill with a report in December to help provide clarity and address legal concerns.
“SB428 started as a small expansion of rank choice voting for localities (dropped from the final bill) but more importantly became a bill to address the Department of Election’s legal concerns,” VanValkenburg said in a statement to Virginia Scope at the time.
In a report completed by the Department of Elections after Arlington’s primary election last year, they describe their concerns in depth.
“Though no locality immediately opted to use RCV upon adoption of the RCV statute, ELECT began taking measures towards implementation,” the report says. “In addition to internal efforts, ELECT sought the input of key stakeholders, including general registrars and electoral boards members. The more recent development of procedures came in preparation for the first use of RCV by Arlington County in 2023. As part of the development of RCV processes and procedures, it became clear that amendments were necessary to the existing RCV regulations.”
The report identified two problems that occurred ahead of the first RCV election in Arlington: voter outreach to educate voters about the process and the method of tabulation used in the multi-winner election.
Arlington officials opted not to use RCV in the November general elections so that they would have more time to work on these issues.
The legislation would have codified the actions needed to address these concerns and other potential legal issues.
“The bill made a series of changes the Department asked for to ensure for a smoother and more legally sound process for ranked-choice voting,” VanValkenburg said. “This bill was about sound governance. By vetoing the bill the Governor repudiated his own department and its report and failed to make the legal changes that would make our elections more sound.”
In his veto statement, Youngkin described the RCV process as confusing. The amended legislation, however, would not have expanded the process already in place. It would have codified a process to help with the confusion, which is part of what the Department of Elections asked for in their report.
“RCV is new in the Commonwealth of Virginia, and nationwide. Concerns have been raised about its use in general elections where some voters have found it confusing,” Youngkin wrote. “A heightened risk of mistakenly erroneous ballot submissions raises concerns about disenfranchisement and an increased lack of voter confidence in election results. Before RCV is further institutionalized and regulated at the Virginia Department of Elections, the legitimate questions of voters need to be answered.”