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24 U.S. cities have used STV - with more to come

  • Tom Monto
  • Nov 5, 2021
  • 27 min read

Updated: May 14

Between 1915 and 1960 two dozen U.S. cities adopted Single Transferable Voting (STV).

By 1962 all but one had discarded it.


Cambridge (Mass) was the only one that continued to use it after 1962 - and continues to use it to the present time.


It has been joined by Minneapolis and more recently by Albany, New York and others.


Amherst (Mass) is hoping to hold its first STV election in November 2024.

This report by the town's Ranked vote Commission serves up interesting info on STV:

Commission report (Dec. 1, 2020) https://www.amherstma.gov/DocumentCenter/View/53914/RCVC_Report_2020-12-01 Ashtabula led the way to STV

Ashtabula (Ohio) was the first city in U.S. (actually in North America) to adopt STV. That was in 1915.


(In Canada Calgary took the plunge just two years after Ashtabula. And within months several municipalities in BC adopted the fair way to vote. This was followed by Winnipeg, Regina and Saskatoon in 1920, Vancouver and Victoria in 1921, and Edmonton in 1923 and Lethbridge in 1928.)

After Ashtabula, several U.S. cities switched to fair voting under STV.


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[San Franscisco, Los Angeles used STV but neither on list below.

"Quarterly report of popular government," state by state

see Equity series, Jan. 1913

[see that quarterly for "The "Representative Council" Plan of City Charter"

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These U.S. cities used STV:

Ashtabula 1915

Boulder, Colorado

Kalamazoo, Michigan

Sacramento, California

West Hartford. Conn.

Cleveland 1921 (see below)

Cincinnati 1929 (used STV 1929-1957)

Toledo (Ohio)

Hamilton (Ohio) 1926

Wheeling, West Virginia

NYC 1937 (used STV 1937- 1947) (see below)


NYC was followed by 13 more, including

seven in Massachusetts,

Norris, Tennessee

Yonkers, NY


Cambridge, Mass. 1941-present (for long time Cambridge was the only city using STV)

STV in Cambridge has had its challenges. Rebuffed by referendum defeat in 1940, the movement persevered and the next saw a majority vote for change. Then STV survived five repeal referendums before 1965, and more since then.

Lowell, Mass.

Long Beach, NY

Coos Bay, Oregon


These five cities in Mass. adopted STV in the 1950s.

Saugus, Mass.

Worcester, Mass. used STV 1949- 1961

Medford, Mass.

Quincy, Mass.

Revere, Mass.


Hopkins, Minnesota ca. 1946-1957

Oak Ridge Tennessee ca. 1947-ca. 1955.

==========================================


Minneapolis, Minnesota and Albany, New York has joined Cambridge in using STV.

as of 2025 also Portland, Oregon and Amherst Mass.


voters of Portland (Maine) voted to have STV whenever multiple members are elected but its politicians, including three at-large members, are elected in rotation (staggered terms) so never are multiple members elected.

(more on this in this Montopedia blog:

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(In Canada most cities dropped STV by 1930. Winnipeg and Calgary were the only large Canadian cities to continue to use it past 1930. Saskatoon did use it again from 1938 to 1942.)

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PR under attack in U.S. cities

By the 1950s PR was under attack in most cities that still had it.


Ashtabula had dropped it after just a few years. Being dissected by social scientists each election cycle apparently irritated the locals!


Other cities also gave up STV easily.


Some cities saw valiant PR-defenders hold off the attack until final defeat.


In Cleveland, well-financed opponents sponsored five repeal referendums in the first ten years of STV, with voters voting down a return to X voting four times until a fifth vote saw a majority vote to sink STV after about 10 years of use.


In Hamilton, too, STV was sustained in four votes but died on the fifth.


NYC voted it out just after WWII.


Neighbouring Long Beach discarded STV in 1947; nearby Yonkers in 1948.


Boulder (in 1947), Toledo (in 1949), and Wheeling (in 1951) also took that step backwards.


In Cincinnati it was voted out in 1957.


After Hamilton) voted it out in 1962, Cambridge became the last to continue to use the fair system of election.


Cambridge has seen several votes on the retention of STV. And each time - so far - most voters have voted to maintain it.


The online source looks to be worth a careful study:

================


Cleveland City Council

1923 under STV 106,000 votes were cast for council. 86,000 were used to elect winners.

In previous election (1921), 154,000 voters voted. 130,000 valid votes were cast in the aldermanic contests (each member elected in a separate district) and only 60,000 votes were used to elect someone. (In 1921 mayor was elected by ranked ballots - likely through the Bucklin system - and an Independent candidate was elected after secondary preferences were counted.


==================================

Cleveland's STV adopted prior to the 1923 election had multi-member wards of varying number of seats.

25 members were elected in four districts - two of seven, one of six, one district of five members.

Districts had different number of members as they were unequal in population - the prime objective in laying out the districts was to have districts of social and economic homogeneity, not equality of population.

(from Maxey, "Cleveland Election and the New Charter" American Political Science Review, Feb 1922.

============================================


New York City's STV

uniform quota

so number of members in city hall varied from election to election, and each borough got a different number of seats from election to election.

No attempt was made to have equal representation for a certain number of population but only that each 75,000 votes cast ( or 50,000 or a close number thereto) was to get a representative.


New York City

1937 first woman elected

November 1937 Genevieve Earle (Fusion and Citizens’ Non-Partisan, Minority Leader) see https://www.voteguy.com/2019/02/04/women-in-new-york-citys-ranked-choice-city-council/

Zeller, Belle, and Hugh A. Bone. 1948. “The Repeal of PR in New York City: Ten Years in Retrospect.” American Political Science Review 42, no. 6 (December): 1127–48

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for more info on adoption of PR in U.S. cities, see

THE LOST LEFT OF PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION 

Aidan Calvelli


this 60-page essay covers use of STV in local governments in U.S. 1915-[2015?]


some excerpts:

"This paper is not directly concerned with the political effects or PR or its virtue as a political system. Still, many of the scholars writing about its history have viewed the problem through this lens. 

They have found, among other effects, that PR: 

generally produced “fairer and more proportional representation of political parties,” including third parties; increased representation of racial minorities; 

in part undermined the power of political machines; 

increased the number of effective votes; 

had uncertain effects on the development of political parties (some cities retained a two-party system, while others had multiple parties emerge); 

did little to change voter participation; 

and did not increase political conflict."


Two academic leaders—John Commons of Wisconsin and Charles Beard of Columbia—similarly supported PR because it could represent “all interests and classes,” helping to “defend the masses against the monopolists” who control party bosses.


Others emphasized the goal of increasing participatory opportunities for “those considerable classes of voters” who lacked political power, like farmers, mechanics and laboring men.”


Looking back in 1926 on their years leading the PRL, Hoag and Hallett confirmed that their goals were Progressive, broadly defined.  


To them, PR:

secured majority rule,

recognized minority representation, including “important” third parties;

ended gerrymandering;

representing “unorganized groups”;

fostered continuity and cooperation;

“check[ed] machine rule”;

gave freedom for “independent voting” across party lines;

raised candidate quality;

and decreased fraud.

They rejected “objections” that PR helps radical groups, conceding that the PR rightly “gives them a hearing” and “just representation,” but affirming that “extreme parties”, such asSocialists, [get only] their due” and never more."


Publishing a 380-page “campaign book” in 1912, the [Socialist] party framed support for PR as a crucial “step in the program for the capture of political power by the workers.”


While other groups backed PR in a “more or less half-hearted way,” for Socialists, it was not “a means of catching votes, but an essential preparation for the democratic management of the means by which society feeds, clothes and houses itself.”

The fact that the first two rulings on PR struck it down caused a crisis. PR leaders needed a strategy to save their prized policy: though each state court and constitution was different, the fact that California had relied on Michigan suggested bad precedents would have legs. So, William Anderson, a PRL-aligned political scientist, spun out 18 pages on the “fairly simple problem in the construction of state constitutions,”149 offering a two-step roadmap for beating “doubt[s]” over PR’s constitutionality: First, instead of textualism, show that the historical aim of “all elections” clauses was to establish the “equality of right among voters.” Second, turn the tables, showing that ordinary systems voting—not PR—“destroy the equality which should exist.” Even if provisions on a right to elect “all officers” may make multi-member districts impossible,152 most PR policies could be saved with the right legal arguments. As opposition to PR grew, Anderson’s approach grew in importance.


...with Communists claiming [PR] protected democracy against fascism.

...


(for more info, see

William Anderson, "The Constitutionality of Proportional Representation", 12 National Municipal Review 745, 745 (1923), if you can find it!

==========================


How municipal STV failed in several U.S. cities prior to 1933


Lindsay Rogers  


"PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION AN ANALYSIS OF THE RECORD; The Proposal Made by Judge Seabury for New York Is Weighed In Connection With the Experience of Eight American Cities"


Proportional representation was brought prominently to the fore by Judge Seabury when he recently presented the outline of a new charter for New York City. One of his proposals was the election of a Council whose members would be chosen by boroughs upon a non-partisan ballot at the ratio of one member to each 50,000 registered voters. In the article that follows, Lindsay Rogers, Burgess Professor of Public Law at Columbia University, surveys the experiments in proportional representation which have been made in American cities and the results.


How has proportional representation worked in the few American cities which have tried it?


Do the results of various schemes used on the Continent of Europe read any lesson of encouragement or warning to a populous and party-controlled American municipality which wishes minority representation on its City Council or Board of Aldermen? What kind of a Municipal Legislature would New York have if proportional representation were adopted?

The answers to these questions are that experience elsewhere is an untrustworthy guide, and that conditions in New York are so distinctive that any forecast of results is risky. The most that can be said is that any Municipal Council based on proportional representation could not fail to be an improvement on the present Board of Aldermen. When a community attempts to govern itself, heads are not broken but are counted, as James Russell Lowell once said. Different methods of counting can be used. Judge Seabury wants the count to be proportional and argues that this form of representation is "a well-tried system." Tried it certainly has been, but it is severely criticized wherever it is in use.

The scheme which Judge Seabury proposes, moreover, is, in respect of one important feature, entirely novel. Apart from this feature, however, proportional representation has never been attempted in an area as populous as New York, where political parties have such elaborate organizations and play for such high stakes of political power.


The European "List System.”

On the Continent of Europe, so-called "list systems" are the plan which is favored. The voter casts his ballot for a list of party nominees, and places in the Legislature are apportioned on the basis of the support given to the different parties. Thus, with an electorate of 100,000 and 100 seats in the Legislature, a vote of 50,000 for the Conservative party, a vote of 30,000 for the Liberal party and a vote of 20,000 for the Labor party would mean that in the Legislature there would be fifty Conservatives, thirty Liberals and twenty Laborites. That is the simplest form of proportional representation, but, as is obvious, it gives great power to party organizations. They determine who shall be nominated. Independent candidacies are difficult if not impossible.


In order to have a non-partisan ballot and to encourage independent candidacies, American cities have used another form of proportional representation-the so-called "single transferable vote" or the "Hare" system, so named after Thomas Hare, the English barrister, who proposed it seventy-five years ago. Nominations are made without party designation, and the voter expresses his preferences among the candidates-1, 2, 3, 4, &c. He can express as many preferences as there are candidates. To be elected, a candidate must have counted for him enough ballots to give him his “quota.” That is a figure (simple enough but always mysterious to many voters) which is usually calculated by taking the total vote, dividing it by one more than the number of places to be filled, and adding one. In reality, this is the formula for an absolute majority if one place is to be filled the electorate divided by two, plus one. Thus if 6,000 votes were cast under the single transferable system and there were five places to be filled, the quota would be 1,001-the total vote divided by six, plus one. Manifestly not more than five candidates can receive the quota. The voters, then, express their preferences, the first choices on the ballots are counted, and any candidate who has 1,001 first choices is elected. If candidates have more than 1,001 first choices, the surplus ballots are transferred to the candidates who are marked as second choices. If there are no surpluses to be distributed, the least-favored candidates are eliminated and the second choices on their ballots are counted.

This is the scheme which is used in American cities.


A Fixed-Quota System.

Judge Seabury, however. proposes a change which would make the quota more understandable to the electorate He would have a fixed quota. A candidate would be elected when 50,000 ballots were counted for him. If, on the count of the first choices, a candidate received 50,000, the rest of the ballots on which he was the first choice would be counted according to the second preferences which had been expressed. If these second preferences were for a candidate already elected, then third preferences would be tabulated, and so on. When this process was complete, candidates at the bottom of the list would be eliminated and the second preferences on their ballots would count.


For It is in respect of this fixed-quota scheme as applied to the single transferable vote that the Seabury proposal is novel.


The fixed-quota principle is used in Germany but in connection with a list system. every 60,000 votes cast for a German party list, one candidate is elected to the Reichstag. Hence in Germany the size of the Reichstag is never known until the vote is counted. In 1928 the Reichstag had 491 members; after the elections of 1930 it had 577 members. On the basis of the vote normally polled in New York City and a quota of 50,000, there would be a Council of perhaps twenty-five members.


Even though there is, so far as I know, no experience whatever with a single transferable vote on a fixed quota, there is no reason why the plan would not work. Its results might be different from the results in American cities using the quota based on a formula. But, as has been said, it is not possible to speak too positively about those results.


Use in American Cities.

Despite the fact that the last quarter of a century has seen tremendous changes in the forms of American municipal government, the advocates of proportional representation - and they have been very active-have no spectacular record of successful advocacy. At the present time proportional representation is used by only three American cities: Cincinnati, Hamilton, Ohio, and Boulder, Col. It has been used and abandoned by Cleveland, Ashtabula, Ohio; Sacramento, Cal.; Kalamazoo, Mich., and West Hartford, Conn.

These experiments can be passed in summary review, chronologically.


Ashtabula was the first American city to adopt the single transferable vote for the choice of its City Council (in 1915), and there were eight elections before the scheme was abandoned by referendum in 1929. The most spectacular result was an apparent representation of different races. Ashtabula is an industrial city, whose 20,000 inhabitants are largely foreign. There were four wards. The Italians dominated one. the Swedes and Finns another, and the two remaining wards were in the control of the non-Europeans— that is, the Americans. But who can say whether this experience suggests the likelihood of racial groupings and candidacies in a city like New York? Observers agreed that there was some improvement in the "quality" of the Council, but it was impossible to say that this resulted from proportional representation. Political parties practically disappeared, neighborhood association was important in the support of candidates, and in several elections religious groups put forward candidates and got them elected. While the general level of ability in the Council seemed to rise, persons of outstanding importance did not enter municipal politics. The City Council made frequent changes of City Managers, and this was one of the reasons why in 1929 proportional representation was abandoned.


The Results in Boulder.

Boulder adopted proportional representation in 1917 and elected a Council of nine for a term of six years, three members standing for re-election every two years. The population, largely non-industrial and non-foreign, is something over 11,000, and observers say that the personnel of the City Council, already high, has not been appreciably improved by proportional representation. It is a rather striking fact that in the 1929 election-the seventh under the new system-27.4 per cent of the ballots cast were blank or incorrectly marked and invalid.


Kalamazoo adopted proportional representation in 1918 and held two elections before the scheme was declared unconstitutional. At the first election, out of a registered vote of 9,000, only 4,461 votes were cast. At the second election there were less than 6,000 votes, even though women had been enfranchised.


The State Court Decision.

In 1920 the Michigan Supreme Court interposed its veto. The State Constitution forbade villages or cities from abridging "the right of elective franchise." The court said that "the right of franchise" meant the right to vote for all officers voted for in the district of the voter. He could be limited to voting for one candidate when one Alderman was elected from each of seven wards. But it was "unconstitutional" to provide that his ballot should be counted for only one candidate when seven Aldermen were chosen at large by the "single transferable vote." On such reasoning the only charitable attitude is silence.


Sacramento in 1921 chose a Council by proportional representation, but before the second election in 1923 the courts interposed a veto.


West Hartford employed proportional representation in two elections 1921 and 1922--but the Legislature in 1923 forbade any municipality to use this method of counting votes.


A PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION TEST

Analysis of the Record of Eight American Cities


Cleveland adopted a city-manager charter and proportional representation in 1921, and the first election was held in 1923. The city was divided into four districts for the election of twenty-five Councilmen - one district electing five, another six and two seven each. To the first Council four independents were elected, and there were fifteen Republicans and six Democrats.


There was not much change in the forces which controlled the Council. In 1925 there was a referendum on repeal of the charter. Out of a total registered vote of 212,000 only 41,271 voted. and proportional representation was saved by a majority of 550. At the second election of the Council, in 1925, twenty-two of the twenty-five members were re-elected. The Cleveland Plain Dealer, summing up the situation, said that proportional representation:

1) enabled each group in the community to get the representation to which its numerical strength entitled it;

(2) made possible the election of a few independents, and

(3) made it certain that the city-manager plan would not be scrapped.


On the other hand,

(1) public interest in Councilmanic elections had decreased;

(2) no considerable number of candidates of outstanding merit were willing to stand, and

(3) the party organizations still controlled the Council through a bipartisan compact for the division of spoils.


Charter Retained.

There were referendums on repeal in 1927 and 1929, with the charter being retained by narrow majorities. Observers seemed to agree that the Council elected in 1929 was probably the best that Cleveland had ever had, but there developed a fight over the dismissal of the City Manager, and this led to the success of a referendum on the abandonment of proportional representation.


Cincinnati followed the example of Cleveland in 1925. The Republican organization had controlled thirty-one of the thirty-two members of the City Council. Under proportional representation it secured three of the nine Councilmen. At the second election, in 1927, seven of the nine Councilmen were re-elected, and, in 1929, even though four of the six non-organization men refused to run again, the Republican machine was able to capture only three places. The total vote was 138,756-the largest number of ballots which had been counted with the transfer of second and subsequent choices. A larger electorate in Cleveland had been divided into four wards.


At the 1931 election the Republicans increased their representation to four, but the pro-charter forces still controlled the Council.


Hamilton adopted proportional representation in 1926. influenced somewhat by Cincinnati's experiment. The interests responsible for the adoption of the new charter elected, in 1927, four members of the Council; two of the remaining three places went to candidates of the Public Ownership League, and the seventh place fell to the Democratic organization.


Abandonment of proportional representation was decisively defeated in 1929, and the third election, in 1931, was hailed as another triumph of independents over the machine.


This American experience is inconclusive. Councils seem to be better. Certainly the New York Board of Aldermen, if elected by proportional representation, could be no worse than it is now, with a single minority member and with the others completely subservient to a party organization. Certainly a City Council elected by proportional representation could not escape being better than the Board of Aldermen. How many minority members would be elected by proportional representation is a matter of doubt. How many independent citizens of outstanding ability could be elected is equally uncertain. The number of candidacies, the discrimination with which preferences would be indicated, and the success of Tammany in having its cohorts vote in certain ways for Tammany-supported nominees, would influence the composition of the City Council. How far races and religions would coalesce no one can know in advance of the coalescing.


Difficulty in New York.

In New York City the single transferable vote would be applied under especial difficulties because of the size of the electorate.


The Seabury plan would have no wards. Nominations would be by boroughs. Thus in Brooklyn the electorate would be more than 500,000 as against, say, 140,000 in Cincinnati or 35,000 in one of the Cleveland wards. That would raise formidable difficulties in respect of the count. Eight days were required in 1931 to count the Cincinnati vote.


Judge Seabury suggests that even though "the public will not know the final results of the election until several days after it has been held,' it is "more important to be represented at the City Hall for four years than it is to celebrate one night in Times Square."


That may be true; but electorates get suspicious of a voting system which requires counting and recounting of ballots. Only a small percentage of the electorate will ever understand what is actually being done.


One should not overlook the fact also that in New York City there are men with considerable experience in manipulating election results. If manipulation can take place when the task of election officials is no more than to announce totals, manipulation may be invited as the mechanics of the count are further complicated. These complications, largely inevitable, are perhaps the most formidable obstacle that proportional representation faces.


Judge Seabury dismisses the complications by using an analogy. "With the mechanics of the count,” he declares, the elector "is no more concerned than he is with the mechanism of his electric light or his radio. It is sufficient that he presses the button and the desired result ensues." But if the button is pressed and the desired result does not ensue, a technician can be sent for and he makes it certain that the desired result will ensue. This is not possible if "the mechanics of the count" seem to the voter to have a result which is undesired. He may not know what he desires, but he is pretty sure to think that he has got something else. The user of the radio wants a particular station and no static. The voter wants-he is not sure what-and he doesn't understand how he gets or fails to get it.


After several Cleveland elections, Newton D. Baker said that the election might be by proportional representation, but "just what proportion, and what the proportion is, with regard to any particular Councilman, I have never been able to discover."


When doctors are puzzled, advocates are muzzled.


A well-tried system, says Judge Seabury.


Yes, but on trial also.


Wherever it is used, proportional representation has severe critics Professor Herbert Kraus of the University of Göttingen, the author of the most recent book on the Weimar Constitution, says that German opinion "is almost unanimous in the conviction that it [proportional representation] has proved to be a mistake and that unless it is rejected, it should at least be fundamentally modified."


There are strong critics in Ireland. The Cleveland experiment was abandoned.


But perhaps every existing electoral system is subject to criticism. Certainly electoral methods in the United States are constantly under fire. Many in Great Britain wish to change the method of choosing the House of Commons.


One should perhaps discount the criticisms of proportional representation, but assuredly it is no panacea which will of itself furnish good government These somewhat pessimistic remarks are not intended to suggest that proportional representation should not be experimented with in New York City. The scheme is well worth a trial. Certainly it is difficult to imagine a body less representative than the present Board of Aldermen. If used for the election of the Board of Aldermen, proportional representation could not do a worse job than is done at the present time.


All I mean to suggest is that one should not be too optimistic as to the benefits which will result or believe that party organizations will not play on the bewilderment and ignorance of the voters and urge - perhaps successfully - a return to the present system of plurality elections.


==thus ended Lindsay Rogers's article from 1933.==

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Today in the United States, there are four [or so] ways to populate a legislature


(Alternative voting is used in a couple states to elect members.


(Group ticket voting is another way, used to select the electoral college in most states.)


[First past the post]

One is to hold elections in a series of single-seat districts, awarding each seat to the person with most votes. When each voter in each district can mark only one candidate, this method is called “first-past-the-post.” Ranked voting and runoff methods are increasingly popular, but all ask voters to pick between the top two candidates.

If the same kinds of candidates contest all of the districts, only one or two groups will win seats (Duverger 1954; Cox 1997). This is how we elect the U.S. House of Representatives and most other bodies. [Block Voting] A second way is to elect all members from one multi-seat district. Voters mark as many candidates as they want, up to the number of winners to elect. If the largest group of voters votes the same way, and if they use all available votes, only that group will win seats (Calabrese 2000; Colomer 2007). At-large, plurality elections of this type became popular in local government in the first half of the 20th century. Congress banned this method for federal elections in 1967, and some states still use it for lower-chamber contests.

[Limited Voting and Cumulative Voting] A third approach retains the multi-seat district but limits the number of votes one can cast (i.e., limited voting). The reason for this is to let the next-largest group win some seats.

One can get the same result by letting voters cast more than one vote for a single candidate (i.e., cumulative voting). These rules exist for some local elections where racial discrimination is a problem. Connecticut and Pennsylvania use limited voting so that Democrats can win seats in Republican towns and vice-versa. Illinois state house elections were by cumulative voting from 1870-1980. Evidence suggests these methods lead to population-proportional results when there is a cohesive majority and just one minority (Brockington et al. 1998; Gerber et al. 1998; Bowler et al. 2003).

[STV (“proportional representation via the single transferable vote,” or PR-STV] The fourth way to fill a legislature increases the odds that even smaller groups will win seats. If voters in each group pick the same set of candidates, and if those groups are arbitrarily large, each group wins seats in rough proportion to its votes.

[actually, I would say:

The fourth way to fill a legislature ensutres tht each substantial group in a district will win one or more seats. each voter has just one vote (although two or more members are being elected), but rank many candaites as back-up prefernces to allow the vote to be transferred if it would otherwise be cast aside. Under this system, each group wins seats in rough proportion to its votes.

Australia, Ireland, Malta, use this system to elect members of the national government and New Zealand, and Scotland uses it for municipal elections.



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U.S. cities

From 1915 to 1961, STV was used in 24 American cities for city elections.

Since 1962 [prior to 2000s] only the voters of Cambridge (Massachusetts) have used this system to elect city council elections. [but more cities are beginning to use as of 2024]. ... A binding 2006 referendum in Minneapolis established STV for that city’s library board elections.


The New York City school board was elected by STV until 2002. Under a random-transfer STV rule such as the “Cincinnati method” used in all American cities, ballots are randomly drawn from the winning candidates’ piles. [this may be the whole-vote method of transfer of surplus votes which is actually semi-random ]

[for info on Cincinnati STV see

https://equitabledemocracy.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Engstrom-Cincy-1988-STV-initiative-Elect-St.pdf] ... No American city in this analysis had AV elections [single-winner contests where ranked votes are used].



DISTRICT MAGNITUDES in STV CITIES

Of the 24 PR cities, 20 had fully at-large elections with district magnitudes of seven or nine. This meant that the minimum percentage of votes needed to win a seat was either 12.5 or ten. [actually it meant that the percentage of votes needed to be certain of winning a seat was 12.5 or ten - some seats were won with less.]

The other four cities had multi-seat wards with a range of magnitudes 3 to 7 Elections in Boulder were staggered such that three of nine seats were filled in each election, giving a Droop quota of 25 percent. (Winter 1982: 9).

Cleveland had four districts of seven, five, six, and seven seats, respectively, so that the quota ranged from 12.5 to 16.6 percent of votes (Moley 1923: 653).

West Hartford had four districts of five, one, four, and five seats. (Gallup 1921: 358).

Finally, New York City treated each borough as its own district whose magnitude varied with turnout.

Table 1.2 gives the district magnitude in each borough at each of the five PR elections. [see my blog on NYC for this information]

Except one single-seat district in each of New York and West Hartford, parties in all PR cities never used a quota of more than 25 percent (DM was never less than 3] ... Staten Island: The official numbers of candidates [elected members?] were seven in 1937, four in 1939, two in 1941, two in 1943, then three in 1945.


STV in U.S.

Santucci described three very different cities representing the US experience with PR:

Cincinnati (1929-1957);

New York City (1937-1947); and

Worcester, Mass. (1949-1961)

================================

Santucci (p. 18) reported that the 24 cities had different STV systems:

20 used at-large, all elected at once with DM of 7 or 9

Boulder -- 3 elected at a time, staggered terms - 9 members on council

Cleveland -- four wards -- DM of 5, 6, 7, 7.

West Hartford -- four wards - DM of 1, 4, 5, 5.

New York City -- treated each borough as a district. DM varied with turnout. DM was 1 or ranged from 3 to 9.

(from Santucci, p. 18)

============================================


No American city in this analysis had AV elections [none for election of city councillors and possibly none for mayors too?].

[all city councillors elected in multi-winner contests]


Of the 24 PR cities,


20 had fully at-large elections with district magnitudes of seven or nine. This meant that the percentage of votes [certain] to win a seat was either 12.5 or ten.

The four other cities had multi-seat districts with a range of magnitudes.


Elections in Boulder were staggered such that three of nine seats were filled in each election, giving a Droop quota of 25 percent (Winter 1982: 9).


Cleveland had four districts of seven, five, six, and seven seats, respectively, so that the quota ranged from 12.5 to 16.6 percent of votes (Moley 1923: 653).


West Hartford had four districts of five, one, four, and five seats. (Gallup 1921: 358).


New York City treated each borough as its own district whose magnitude varied with turnout. Table 1.2 gives the district magnitude in each borough at each of the five PR elections. [info presented above]


Except one single-seat district in each of New York and West Hartford, parties in all PR cities never confronted a threshold of more than 25 percent. [in other words, never was DM less than three.)


====================================================

STV Methods Varied


STV systems vary on five main aspects:

DM -- the range of DM in the U.S. described above


Method of surplus vote transfer

random two different methods

Cincinnati method - numbered the ballots one by one and then a mathematical ratio was derived and then applied to the ballots in order that say every 4th ballot was extracted if 25 percent was needed.

Toledo method -- stop receiving - after quota is reached, any arriving votes are re-routed to next usable marked preference


whole-vote transfer -- proportional transfer of surplus votes based on next usable marked preference. used in Boulder, Colorado and in Malta, Ireland, and historically most STV systems in Canada.


(Gregory method was not used in any STV system in Ohio, according to Barber's book. NYC also did not use Gregory, nor Cambridge. Other than that, I don't know what transfer method was used in NYC.)


Ballot design (little known about this aspect)


Preferences - how many preferences had to be marked by voter

(little known about this aspect in historical uses of STV in the U.S.)


Casual vacancies

Casual vacancies may result in fluctuations in DM if staggered terms are used (such as Boulder)

DM does not fluctuate if a casual vacancy is filled by a separate election held between general elections or if it is filled in a separate contest even if the contest is filled at same time as the next election.

============================================


STV in Ohio

Ashtabula STV 1917-

Cleveland

Cincinnati

Hamilton STV repealed in 1960 by referendum, replaced by block voting at large (Barber, p. 236)

Toledo

========

Cincinnati

had STV elections 1925 to 1955

elections held each odd-numbered year



1925 first black elected in Cincinnatti's history was due to adoption of STV.


=====

1954 referendum

Yes (to repeal STV) 74,872

No (to retain STV) 75,544

(National Municipal Review, Jan 1955) [print-out in my files]

But despite this referendum result, Cincinnati cancelled STV just three years later.

=====

1988 referendum

Richard L. Engstrom, Cincinnati’s 1988 Proportional Representation Initiative

Electoral Studies (1990), 9:3, 217-225

In a 1988 referendum the voters of Cincinnati rejected by 55 percent to 45 percent a proposal to adopt STV for electing the Cincinnati city council.

STV had been in use in Cincinnati from 1925 until 1957 and it was the first effort to bring it back.

============================


Sources for info on STV used in U.S. cities


book:

Kathleen L. Barber, PR and Election Reform in Ohio (1995)






See also


HOW PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION GAVE AMERICAN VOTERS MEANINGFUL REPRESENTATION IN THE 1900s

And how racial fears and the Red Scare stopped it in its tracks


Notes from Joseph P. Harris The Practical Workings of Proportional Representation in the U.S. and Canada (1930)

(see notes below)


online:

Santucci (thesis) Three Articles on PR with an introduction


Richard L. Engstrom, Cincinnati’s 1988 Proportional Representation Initiative

Electoral Studies (1990), 9:3, 217-225


Aidan Calvelli "The Lost Left in PR"


Thanks for reading.

=====================================

Moves toward STV in 2000s


2006 Minneapolis, MN, adopts STV-PR.

Minneapolis adopted PR by initiative in 2006. The result was challenged in court, and the initiative was upheld in 2009. STV will be used for the Board of Estimate and Taxation and Park Board at-large seats. The Minneapolis city council is elected from single-seat wards, for which seats, along with the mayor and other single-seat offices, the initiative specifies IRV.


2006 Davis, California, passes advisory measure favoring STV-PR.


2021 Portland, Oregon to elect city councillors, in four 3-seat wards. (put into use in 2024)


2023 Portland, Maine

The city council of nine members is elected by the citizens of Portland. The city has five voting districts, with each district electing one city councillor for a three-year term. An additional three members of the city council are elected at-large.

The three at-large members are elected through STV, what Portland calls "Proportional ranked-choice voting". (wikipedia says four at-large members but Portland's official website says three)


Councillors serve three-year terms -- staggered terms.

the election of November 2023 saw just one at-large seat open.

only two candidates ran so just FPTP process, not even IRV, and not STV.


The ratifying referendum read:

"authorizing the city to use a proportional ranked choice voting method for elections in which more than one person is to be elected to a single office (i.e. a multiple seat election) and directs the city council to enact an ordinance to establish the proportional ranked choice voting method."


But either incidentally or purposefully as a way to get around the results of the referendum, Portland (Maine) uses staggered terms so never elects multiple members at one time, a prerequisite for STV.

Just one at-large member was elected in 2023, and only at-large councillors are elected in a multi-member district, so it seems that STV is not being used to elect city council to any great extent...


As well The City of Portland had a four-seat at-large Charter Commission contest scheduled for June 8, 2021. Apparently when it is to be re-elected, it is to be done through STV.

but "multi-pass IRV" is also discussed.


Portland's Mayor is elected through IRV. The current mayor is Mark Dion, who narrowly defeated city councilor Andrew Zarro in the 5th count in the November 2023 election. Successive counts where least-popular candidates were eliminated eventually saw only two in the running. The 1st-count front runner was elected in the end, although the second runner-up had accumulated 4000 votes while the front runner accumulated just 2000 more, over and above his 1st count vote tally.

================================


Notes from Joseph P. Harris The Practical Workings of Proportional Representation in the U.S. and Canada (1930)


A very good and detailed examination of processes of STV

and its variations such as a "fixed quota" as a means of making it simpler to communicate and thus easier to sell (p. 379)


as well, there is city by city chronology and analysis of STV


Cleveland

Boulder p. 360

Hamilton (Ohio) p. 361

Kalamazoo (Ohio) p. 362

Sacramento p. 363

West Hartford p. 363


Calgary p. 365

Winnipeg p. 366


Past Experience Analyzed p. 368

Effective votes

Does PR secure a more representative council? p. 371

"the election of capable persons is of far more importance than the election of typical citizens."

Does STV increase racial and religious voting?

Does it elect radicals? p. 373

Are better councilmen elected? p. 373

How does PR affect political parties? p. 364

How does PR affect votes cast? p. 364

Invalid ballots

Does the transfer of votes change the results? p. 376 (#50)

(vote transfers seldom affect results but they are useful back-up measures)

p. 379 (#53) election of those in winning position in first count


Is PR popular with the voters? p. 378


p. 378 (#52) referendums on STV


General Summary and suggested simplifications p. 379

Fixed quota  -- as Droop quota is difficult to explain, a fixed quota may be used instead but that means varying numbers are elected.

(I think NY City used fixed quota in city elections but also it used fixed quota to set seat count in each borough.)


Harris: the real purpose of the quota is not to fix a number that must be reached by a candidate to be elected but rather to fix a number beyond which votes will not be counted for a candidate. There are almost always some candidates elected without reaching quota. ...

the effective principle of the quota is to turn back the surplus votes so as to prevent votes being wasted upon a popular candidate.

Even Hare is simpler than Droop.


p. 381

Surplus vote transfers -- instead of mathematical "exact" whole-vote method or the mathematical and complicated fractional Gregory method, a candidate simply stops accepting votes once quota is reached.


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