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Like Minneapolis in 2006, enough Saint Paul residents signed petitions to place a Charter amendment on the General Election ballot asking voters to approve a new Instant Runoff Voting (Ranked Choice Voting) system for city elections. Unlike Minneapolis, St. Paul's City Council, armed with a City Attorney's opinion allowing it to deny access to the ballot until the question of the system's constitutionality was settled, initially refused to follow the will of the signatories while they waited for the outcome of a court case challenging the Minneapolis system. The district court, finally affirmed by the Minnesota Supreme Court, upheld the system's constitutionality - and the St. Paul Council was then forced by law to place the question on this year's General Election ballot. In Minneapolis, the City Council supports the idea; in St. Paul, a majority of its councilmembers does not.
Meanwhile, for the first time in its history, Minneapolis had no need for a primary election this year; across the river while St. Paul's September primary drew less than 5% of eligible voters, a turnout figure cited by RCV/IRV supporters as one of the reasons to conflate city elections into one general election and allow all candidates to compete on a single ballot.
TTT's ANDY DRISCOLL queries advocates on both sides of St. Paul's campaign to determine if St. Paul voters should or should not go the way of Minneapolis and approve its Ranked Choice Voting system.
GUESTS:
• KATHY LANTRY-President, St. Paul's City Council
• JOHN HOTTINGER-former State Senate Majority Leader (supporter of IRV/RCV)
• JEANNE MASSEY-Executive Director, FairVote Minnesota - parent of Better Ballot St. Paul
• CHUCK REPKE-Co-chair, No Bad Ballots Committee - a Saint Paul group opposing IRV.
• RACHEL SMITH - Program Director, Excellence in Election Administration in the Humphrey Institute's Center for the Study of Politics and Governance
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