Public Interest Groups

California Common Cause
California Public Interest Research Group (CalPIRG)
Global Exchange
League of Women Voters of California

Election Reform Organizations

FairVote - The Center for Voting and Democracy
Californians for Electoral Reform
Davis Citizens for Representation
Marin Ranked Voting
Santa Monica Ranked Voting

Civil Rights/Voting Rights Organizations

This page is still under development. Meanwhile, download this brochure.

The material on this page is available as a tri-fold brochure in our downloads section.

A Choice of Voting Systems

This article is reprinted with minor editorial changes from a press release issued by Sen. Debra Bowen on March 29, 2005.

SACRAMENTO – Local governments would be able to let voters elect officials via a ranked voting system that eliminates the need for a separate runoff election under SB 596 by Senator Debra Bowen (D-Redondo Beach), which will be heard by the Senate Elections, Reapportionment & Constitutional Amendments Committee in early April.

San Rafael can adopt ranked voting by charter amendment. Under current state law, the county government and the other ten cities in Marin would have to adopt charters. But Senate Bill 596, introducted in March 2005 by Sen. Debra Bowen would eliminate that requirement.

In the following pages, we describe what is involved in adopting a charter and provide details on SB 596. Finally, we need to make sure that our voting equipment supports ranked voting, and that our software can be upgraded at reasonable cost to count ranked voting ballots.

The following article is reproduced with permission from Davis Citizens for Representation. It will soon be rewritten to discuss the situation in Marin County.

Next Steps for Davis

In California, the Government Code and election laws make no provision for choice voting, and contain many provisions that might be inconsistent with it. So to use choice voting, Davis must first become a charter city. Under the State Constitution, charter cities can design their own voting methods and election rules.