Ranked-Choice Voting Could Soon Come To NYC

NEW YORK — New York City voters may soon get to choose five candidates for mayor instead of just one. Voters will decide in November whether to adopt a ranked-choice voting system for municipal elections that would do away with runoff contests in crowded races.

The proposal is among a slate of reforms that the 2019 Charter Revision Commission moved to put to voters at its final public meeting on Wednesday.

Under the proposed scheme, New Yorkers casting ballots in primary and special elections would rank as many as five candidates in order of preference for mayor, public advocate, comptroller, borough president and City Council starting in 2021.

If no one wins a majority of the votes, the last-place candidate would be eliminated and people who ranked them first would have their votes counted for their second choice. That process would continue until there are only two candidates left, and the one with the most votes would be declared the winner.

Election-reform advocates have argued that ranked-choice voting helps governments avoid unnecessary runoff votes, which generally attract low turnout and cost a lot of money. Some 19 U.S. cities and the entire state of Maine have implemented ranked-choice voting or are on their way to doing so, according to FairVote, a nationwide group that backs the idea.

That's not the only proposal that will go to voters across the city on Election Day this fall. The panel approved a slate of five ballot measures that encompasses several changes to the city's governing document.

Another proposal would further empower the Civilian Complaint Review Board overseeing the NYPD by giving it the power to issue subpoenas and guaranteeing it a certain number of staffers relative to the Police Department's ranks. The board would also grow to 15 members from 13.

The measure drew fire from protesters who interrupted the current commission's Wednesday meeting. Holding up photos of Eric Garner, the Staten Island man choked to death by a police officer five years ago, activists called for an elected board to oversee the NYPD.

Activists argue a board elected by the public would be more accountable to and representative of communities mistreated by the police. The protest continued for several minutes before the activists walked out of the City Council chamber, some with their fists in the air.

Other proposals approved by the commission would:

• Ban elected officials and certain appointed officials from lobbying the city agency for which they worked within two years of leaving the government, starting in January 2022.
• Ban members of the city's Conflicts of Interest Board from participating in political campaigns, and limit campaign donations by people doing business with the city to $400 or less.
• Require the City Council to approve the mayor's pick for corporation counsel, the city's top legal job.
• Allow the city to set up a rainy-day fund and tweak the budget process by requiring the mayor to submit a revenue estimate to the Council in April instead of June.
• Require the City Planning Commission to brief community boards and borough presidents on land-use applications at least 30 days before certifying them for the city's review process, and give community boards more time to review applications submitted in June and July.

"I am very proud of the proposals that the commission has devleoped," commission Chair Gail Benjamin said Wednesday. "I believe they represent very important and impactful changes in five areas of city government that we have heard a lot of concerns and ideas for improvements about over the last year."

The Nov. 5 vote — held in an odd year with only a single citywide election — will come about a year after New Yorkers approved three reforms put forward by Mayor Bill de Blasio's separate charter revision commission.

Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that there are no citywide elections this year. There will be a citywide vote for public advocate following Letitia James's departure to become state attorney general. Jumaane Williams won a special election to replace James in February.