{"id":240525,"date":"2026-05-22T13:30:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-22T13:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/240525\/"},"modified":"2026-05-22T13:30:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-22T13:30:09","slug":"ranked-choice-voting-would-make-democracy-work-better-in-albany","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/240525\/","title":{"rendered":"Ranked choice voting would make democracy work better in Albany"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"A<\/p>\n

A sign on Manhattan’s Upper West Side explains ranked choice voting in 2021, the first time New York City used\u00a0the election system.<\/p>\n

Michael M. Santiago\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

When I first learned about ranked choice voting, I thought it was one of those ideas that was too good for the United States. Like excellent train networks, siestas and\u00a0churros with chocolate \u2014 it was, I feared, one more great idea we seemed intent on passing by.<\/p>\n

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But then I learned ranked choice voting has been adopted around the country, from New York City and Newburgh to the entire states of Maine and Alaska, and dozens of other cities and towns. Heck, the Oscar Awards even use ranked choice voting to choose the Best Picture winner.<\/p>\n

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I figured if they can all do it, there\u2019s no reason we can\u2019t do it in Albany.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s so great about it, you ask?<\/p>\n

For voters, ranked choice means that instead of voting for a single candidate, you can rank candidates in the order you prefer them: first choice, second choice, third choice, etc. If your first choice can\u2019t win, your vote automatically transfers to your next choice.<\/p>\n

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This simple change could solve many problems.<\/p>\n

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For one: Under our current election system, voters are often afraid to vote for the candidate we genuinely like most, and instead feel we must vote strategically. Under ranked choice voting, you can vote honestly, even if the candidate you like isn\u2019t popular or belongs to a minor party. There\u2019s no more \u201cspoiler effect.\u201d If your candidate can\u2019t win, your opinion still matters; your vote just transfers to your next choice.<\/p>\n

Another odd quirk of our current election system is how, in elections with three, four or more candidates, a candidate can win with a small fraction of the vote. That leaves a sour taste when most voters supported other candidates. Ranked choice voting solves this, too: A candidate wins only when they\u2019ve received over 50 percent of the vote.<\/p>\n

While we\u2019re fixing our election systems, let\u2019s follow the lead of cities like Minneapolis, Oakland and Boulder and adopt the single unified election model. That would mean no more primaries; instead, all candidates and all voters participate in one election, on Election Day, using ranked choice voting. This lets all registered voters vote in the election that matters \u2013\u2013 that\u2019s how democracy is supposed to work.<\/p>\n

The implementation of both ranked choice voting and elections where all voters can participate has been found to produce results that better reflect the racial and gender demographics of the voters. And having a shorter election season would boost turnout, save us and our recycling bins months of campaign mailers, and save the city money. In this moment, maybe that should be the top selling point.<\/p>\n

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Our group is gathering petition signatures to include this issue on the November ballot as a ballot initiative. We are well on our way, with 1,800 signatures so far of the 2,400 we need.<\/p>\n

At a time when so many of us despair about politics, it\u2019s remarkable to find a within-our-reach fix that would make city elections work better.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m still hoping someone will launch a pro-siesta movement. But in the meantime, adopting ranked choice voting is a no-brainer.<\/p>\n

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Dorian Solot is the co-chair of Ranked Choice Voting Albany (rcvalbany.org<\/a>). She lives in Albany.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A sign on Manhattan’s Upper West Side explains ranked choice voting in 2021, the first time New York…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":240526,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[18281,75,84,83,9,24,63,12522],"class_list":["post-240525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-manhattan","tag-commentary","tag-manhattan","tag-manhattan-headlines","tag-manhattan-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-opiniontu"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=240525"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240525\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/240526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=240525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=240525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=240525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}