As people head to the polls in less than three weeks, residents in Kingston will also be posed a question regarding ranked ballot voting.
Earlier this year, city council decided to ask the public what they think about the idea, before changing the way voters cast their ballots. Dave Meslin, an advocate for the ranking method says it could change the landscape for voters.
The way it works now is whichever candidate garners the most votes wins — this is known as the first-past-the-post method. Ranked ballot voting runs exactly how it sounds. Voters are asked to rank their candidate with No. 1, two or three. With this, officials than count the ballots — the first one with more than 50 per cent of the vote wins. If this isn’t achieved, the process continues.
“The candidate with the least amount gets eliminated and those votes still count. It goes to your second choice,” says Meslin.
Critics say it isn’t a perfect choice to replace the first-past-the-post model as someone’s vote could go towards another candidate if their first choice is voted out. Meslin, who has been speaking about the benefits of ranked ballot voting throughout Ontario, says what it does do, is eliminates the need to vote for someone who you don’t want.”
“The benefits are fair results, with the majority consensus winner,” Meslin says. “You never have to vote strategically or think, ‘I want to vote for this person but I don’t want to waste my vote,’ because your vote always counts.”
City officials have held a number of information sessions and open houses since the beginning of the year regarding the proposed change. Deputy city clerk Janet Jaynes says so far, the opinion varies.
“Reaction has been mixed — some people are strongly for it, some against and a lot of people aren’t sure,” says Jaynes.
The city of Kingston is the third city in Ontario looking into the possibility of ranked balloting. London, Ont., has already implemented it, using the ranking model for this year’s election. Kingston will be joined by the city of Cambridge, holding a referendum on the topic.
Jaynes says if council decided to move forward with this model after the referendum, they would make sure the public is educated well before the next election.
“The city would be conducting a lot of public engagement. They would be required to provide the public with information on how the election would work.”
Ranked ballot voting is already used in leadership races for political parties in Canada. Several cities are also using it across North America. The question regarding ranked ballot voting will be on the ballot when voters head to the polls on Oct. 22.
Comments