IRV/RCV ain't saving money in Mineapolis!

Leave it to Rob Richie and the folks from IRV Factcheck (shhhssss! - don't tell anyone they are really all from FairyTaleVote) to put a positive spin on the high costs of the 2009 Minneapolis RCV election: sure it cost $365,000 to do IRV/RCV in Minneapolis, but it was only the first time. When we do it more often, and buy new voting machines, the cost will come down. Of course they will Rob - we all know you wouldn't BS us about IRV/RCV, would you?

But let's take a real close look at those numbers.
Actual Expenditures:
Total Elections Budget 2005 adj 2.5%/yr (Municipal Primary & General) $ 1,124,602.12
Total Elections Budget 2007 adj 2.5%/yr (No Election) $ 666,591.09
Total Elections Budget 2009 (RCV Municipal General) $ 1,470,329.00
Difference between 2009 and 2005 $ 345,726.88

In other words, the last time there was a municipal election in Minneapolis, there was a primary election as well. There were 16 different contests including the mayor's race, which means it was a citywide primary election. It cost Minneapolis $1,124,602.12 to hold two elections.

Move forward 4 years after all the IRV/RCV hype and BS. For 2009, Minneapolis spent $1,470,329.00, which was a $345,726.88 difference between 2005 (with a primary and general election) and 2009 (where one single IRV/RCV was supposed to save all that money).

Here's the voter turnout in the 2005 and 2009 races:



32,185 votes cast in the 2005 primary election
68,481 votes cast in the 2005 general election
45,117 votes cast in the 2009 IRV/RCV election the lowest turnout in over 100 years since 35,837 votes were cast in 1902, when the city's population was 54% of it's current estimated population!

But there were also 32,185 votes cast in the 2005 primary election - only a 5.81% difference in turnout of registered voters compared with the 2009 IRV/RCV race that was supposed to improve voter turnout!

IRV/RCV advocates like to claim that their method improves voter turnout. Well, the much-ballyhooed IRV/RCV only had a little more turnout than the low-turnout primary elections they are supposed to be an improvement over.

I've used costs per registered voter to show how expensive IRV is, but I've been told by fellow travelers from FairyTaleVote that's not a fair measurement - I must use cost per voter that turned out. OK - I will do that. But it makes matters even worse!



Adjusted for inflation, Minneapolis spent an extra $365,000 for one single IRV/RCV election than they spent for both a primary and a general election in 2005. Even though all IRV/RCV advocates like to claim that an IRV/RCV election is cheaper than holding two elections.

Dividing up the costs per registered voter, once single IRV/RCV election cost each registered Minneapolis voters only $1.46 than the cost of a separate primary and general election in 2005. But that's just per registered voter. Often there are fixed costs that don't change no matter how many voters show up.

IRV advocates like to cite the high cost per vote cast in a primary or runoff election. Adding the total number of votes cast in both the primary and general election in 2007, that antiquated system cost Minneapolis voters $11.17 per vote cast vs. $31.99 per vote cast in the 2009 IRV/RCV election - almost 3 times as much!

But even though you have no way of knowing how many voters show up at the polls, you still gotta keep the precinct polling places open. And Minneapolis had 131 precincts in 2009, the same number in 2005. But in 2005, they had to keep each of those precincts open for the general election as well as the primary election - so it's fair to say that Minneapolis had a cost per precinct of $4292.37 for each of the two elections in 2005 compared with a cost per precinct of $11,223.89 - almost 3 times the cost per precinct! And if you add up both 2005 elections - they cost $8,584.75 per precinct vs. $11,233.89 in 2009.

Oh - and one more thing. The IRV advocates on IRV Factcheck like to claim that there was only one defective ballot out of the 45,968 cast. Bullshit! Maybe only one defective ballot made it through the scanners in 2009, but the Minneapolis Election Department provided information about a higher number of spoiled ballots in 2009, which suggests some serious problems with IRV/RCV

Spoiled Ballots: In the polling place, if a voter makes an error, the voter can return the spoiled ballot to an election judge and receive a new ballot. This number is not included in Total Ballots Cast because the voter received a new ballot.

That makes perfect sense. So let's take a look at the spoiled ballot numbers for the 2005 primary, 2005 general, and the 2009 IRV/RCV election:



Holy Cow Batman - do you see the number of spoiled ballots in Minneapolis?

Compare the number and percentage of spoiled ballots in the 2005 primary election vs. the 2009 IRV/RCV election.

Both elections had many candidates on the ballots. In the 2005 primary you only had to pick one candidate in most of the races. But in the 2009 IRV/RCV race, you not only had to consider who was your favorite candidate (as you did in 2005) but you also had to rank other choices - two additional choices for a total of three possible choices in each race. Think that was easy? Guess again - the spoiled ballot numbers and percentages were three times higher in the 2009 IRV/RCV race as they were in the 2005 primary election.

And when you look at the spoiled ballots as a percentage of the 45,968 total votes cast in the 2009 IRV/RCV race vs. the 100,666 votes cast in both the 2005 primary and general elections. In both 2005 race, the total # of spoiled ballots was 1366, or 1.35% of the 100,666 total votes cast.

In the single IRV/RCV election of 2009, there were 1888 spoiled ballots out of 45,968 ballots - or 4.11%. In other words, a much higher number of spoiled ballots for a smaller number of voters. At that rate, if 70,00 voters would have turned out in 2009, you would have had 2875 spoiled ballots compared with 1366 for November 2005 and 1366 for both 2005 elections.

I don't know where anyone at IRV Factcheck gets off claiming that IRV saves money, and is easy for voters to understand. The number and percentage of spoiled ballots say otherwise - and they also say that the folks pushing IRV - including those at IRV Factcheck - are doing some misrepresentation.

Of course, it wouldn't be the first time they have misrepresented information about IRV - and in one notable case, the courts said IRV/RCV advocates have broken election laws as well:

The panel has concluded that these violations, which were reflected in approximately 40,000 pieces of campaign literature, were multiple and deliberate. They were made despite the clarity of the statutory prohibitions, and the Respondent remains completely unapologetic.

The St. Paul Better Ballot Campaign, which broke the law, was part of Jeanne Massey's FairVoteMN group and in fact FairVoteMN has held "Get out of Jail" fundraising party on January 19th to raise money to pay the $5,000 fine for deliberately breaking MN election law.

IRV Factcheck takes the cake when it comes to misrepresenting the facts about IRV!

Buyer's remorse for Minneaopolis Ranked Choice Voting?

Read an article on a report on the the first Ranked-Choice Voting experience in Minneapolis, held in 2009.

The continuing cost of RCV: $244,000

Barring a change in available technologies, Minneapolis municipal elections could cost almost $250,000 extra every year that ranked-choice voting is in place.

These are costs over and above regular election costs - just specific to their form of IRV.

Last year, the first time the city used RCV, there were about $365,000 in expenses specific to the new voting system, according to an Elections Department study received and filed by the City Council’s Committee of the Whole. That included one-time costs such as vast voter education and a post-election wrap-up survey commissioned to St. Cloud State University researchers.

And they produced a much better post election study of the costs of IRV than we got from either the Wake or Henderson County BOE, or from the State BOE - who all seem to think that one single IRV election will always cost less than a traditional election and any needed runoffs.

But some of those voter education costs are projected to stick around — at least for the near future — since a refresher could be necessary when RCV returns in almost four years. Combined with other on-going costs, such as paying for ballots to be counted by hand, the projected ongoing costs of RCV total about $242,000.

That's right - RCV means continuing costs for voter education and for hand counting as long as there are many different types of IRV/RCV that could be counted on machines or systems are not fully tested and certified for use with IRV/RCV.

Technology could be the savior here. There are machines that can count RCV ballots; however, none are certified yet by the state, and that certification isn’t expected unless more cities switch to RCV. And even then, while the city would save a projected $140,000 in RCV costs by being able to eliminate the hand count, the cost of technology is unknown.

Why would any more cities take the risk of switching to IRV/RCV knowing that they are going to be increasing their costs until and unless more cities also vote to increase their costs for the short term? I thought IRV/RCV was supposed to cost less?

At least one council member, President Barb Johnson (4th Ward), was miffed by the study. She noted that RCV’s supporters had promoted the system by saying it would draw out more voters and cost less than a traditional primary-plus-general election system. Considering the study’s results and last year’s very low voter turnout, she said, “all of these things did not happen in our city.”

Minneapolis had the lowest voter turnout in 100 years! So much for the claim that IRV draws out more voters!

“It is disturbing to me that we’re talking about an extra quarter of a million dollars for a system that was supposed to decrease our costs,” Johnson said.

Thanks for waking up President Johnson! A Cary Town Councilor had the same wake up call in 2007 after she watched the IRV tabulation and saw how complex and confusing it was - and couldn't even be done correctly according to written procedures. Yet because so much of the 2007 IRV pilot program in NC was done under the table and off the books, we may never know exactly how IRV compared cost-wise to traditional elections and rarely needed runoffs.

Find the report at http://bit.ly/d5q2Y1.

Here is exactly the sort of cost report that many verified voting advocates in NC have been asking to see from ANY community or county (or even the State Board of Elections) on their experiences with IRV/RCV. But of course we are not getting this sort of detail even from our own State BOE - whose staff all seem to be in love with IRV and feel it's the coming thing.

Now I wonder if the citizens of St. Paul MN (who passed RCV on the same date as Minneapolis took part in their first RCV elction) will find out about this study and take steps to stop RCV dead in its tracks before they make the same mistakes as Minneapolis did?

Instant Runoff Virus hides campaign cash!

Well I have to admit that I was wrong about Minneapolis doing proper due-diligence on IRV before they pushed it. Here's a story where even IRV supporters say that they made a mistake. So if there is any effect of big money in this election - we won't know about it until late October - just before voters head to the polls.

http://www.startribune.com/local/47110062.html?elr=KArks:DCiUBcy7hUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aU7DYaGEP7vDEh7P:DiUs

Run-off voting delays finance disclosure

Voters for Minneapolis City Council won't find out who's contributing what until November.

By STEVE BRANDT, Star Tribune

Last update: June 6, 2009 - 7:37 PM

Minneapolis elections are likely to unfold this year with less campaign finance disclosure than voters have seen in decades.

That's because the city's planned instant-runoff voting method doesn't use a primary election. That means candidates won't have to file the usual pre-primary report around Labor Day showing who has contributed to their campaigns.

So most election-year contributions won't be disclosed until late October, just before voters head to the polls.

"This is probably a big 'oops' for everybody who was pushing on instant-runoff voting because what you're going to lose is the information of knowing who the political contributors are," said David Schultz, who teaches government ethics and election law at Hamline University.

"That's valuable information because it tells you something about who's trying to influence the campaign, but more importantly contributors might tell you where candidates stand on the issues. You lose valuable clues or cues."

Candidates have been required to disclose their campaign contributors in Minneapolis since the early 1970s, according to Lyall Schwarzkopf, a retired city clerk. The law has required such reports be filed 10 days before the primary and general elections.

Former Council Member Tony Scallon said early reports can provide grist for campaign debates. He recalled a campaign in which he highlighted how much bar owners seeking to defeat Scallon were giving his opponent's campaign, and his opponent called attention to developer contributions to Scallon.

"I think it's important to have as early a read as possible on where the candidates are coming from, where their war chests are coming from," said Pat Scott, another former council member.

Council Member Cam Gordon, an instant-runoff supporter, called the reduced reporting "very unfortunate. It's something that I didn't anticipate." Gordon said that he already has been laying groundwork to propose more frequent reporting of campaign spending and that smaller contributions be reported.

"Having a report in September would be a great thing for voters so they can see who's donating," he said. But the council's Election Committee chair, Elizabeth Glidden, said so far she doesn't have a strong opinion about restoring a mid-election report.

Like other council members, she's expecting a Minnesota Supreme Court ruling soon on a constitutional challenge to instant-runoff voting, in which voters rank up to three candidates for a seat in the order they prefer them. The second and third choices come into play only if the leading candidate fails to reach a majority in a race for a single seat, or the required fraction of votes in multi-seat races.

Meanwhile, the city is developing backup plans to return to traditional elections in case the new method is struck down.

The opinion that without a primary no pre-primary reports are legally required came from the Hennepin County attorney's office because Minneapolis campaign reports are filed with the county. But County Attorney Mike Freeman said although that's the law, he personally thinks more disclosure would be better.

Now this is funny in a way. Because the IRV advocates tell us that IRV removes the effect of big money from campaigns. At least that is what they want us to believe. Here is yet another example of how IRV is supposed to do one thing that benefits the voters (makes big money less effective) and yet does something entirely different (hides campaign cash and makes campaign finance less transparent and more opaque).

So now there is even less information for voters to use to determine who they should vote for first, second and third - compounding the original problems with IRV.

When does IRV go from being a mere virus to become an election pandemic? Then it would be "Instant Runoff Pandemic" - nah, "Instant Runoff Virus" rolls off the tongue better.