Elections Commission

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City and County of San Francisco

Elections Commission

Approved:  August 4, 2004

Minutes of the Meeting held

July 21, 2004

at the

South Of Market Recreation Center

270 – 6^th Street

 

 

1. CALL TO ORDER.  President Townsend called the meeting to order at 6:04 pm.

 

2.         ROLL CALL.  PRESENT: Commissioners Safire, Trasviña, Townsend, Mendelson and Gleason.  ABSENT: Commissioner Kenealey. 

 

 

3.         DIRECTOR’S REPORT.

 

            Ranked Choice Voting (RCV)– The Director John Arntz told the audience that Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) has been the main issue for elections in San Francisco for the last two years.  He explained that, in RCV, voters get to vote three times for the same contest.  The voter will have a first, second and third choice to make.  The Department of Elections has recently had its vote tabulation system certified by the Secretary of State (SOS) for use in the upcoming November election for Supervisors in districts 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 9 and 11.  The ballot will be different from any previously used in San Francisco because it will allow the voter to make three choices.  The Director pointed out that there were brochures and samples of the ballot available on the information table at this meeting.

 

            The Department (DoE) is conducting informational presentations twice a week in City Hall.  The first of these presentations in Chinese will take place on Friday, July 30, 2004 at 2:00 pm in room 416; on August 4, 2004 there will be the first Spanish presentation. 

 

            The DoE is in the process of contracting with nine community organizations for the dispersal of educational information regarding RCV to voters. 

 

            The Director advised that the Department is developing a flash animation link in its website which will allow web visitors to actually vote a hypothetical ballot and watch how the vote is tabulated.

 

            Commissioner Trasviña asked whether, if a voter cast a vote for the same person as his or her first and second choice, the second choice vote would not be counted.  Mr. Arntz replied that this is correct.   Commissioner Trasviña asked if there was any plan to flag that vote so that the voter would be made aware that the vote was cast incorrectly and would not be counted.  Mr. Arntz said that the voting machine would reject the ballot and let the voter know that he or she did not vote correctly according to RCV.

 

            Voter Services Division – This group handles the registration cards for voters.  This division is currently involved in verifying the signatures-in-lieu petitions that have been submitted by candidates and proposition supporters as a manner in which to cut their filing fee expense for appearing on the ballot.  Each candidate or potential proposition gets fifty cents deducted from their filing fee for each valid registered voter who signs their petition.   This division gets thousands of signatures that need to be verified as belonging to registered voters in the appropriate district.

 

            Campaign Services Division – This group runs the DoE’s front desk.  They have been working with the candidates during their signatures-in-lieu campaigns, answering questions about RCV and answering phone calls. 

 

Poll Locating and Americans with Disabilities – Next Monday from noon to 4:30 pm in front of the DoE offices, this group will be hosting a demonstration of various touch screen voting technologies.   The disabled community is especially interested to know how these systems work, should the Department decide to use this technology in the future.  This demonstration is being organized by the Mayor’s Office on Disability and the Department of Elections.

 

Ballot Distribution –This division is preparing to mail 125,000 absentee ballots for this November’s election.  The ballot this year will be large.  It is possible that it may have as many as four cards. 

 

Technology Division – This division is in the process of upgrading the Department’s voter data information.   Prior to an election, the number of DoE staff is approximately 35 people.  As the election approaches, staffing increases to over 200 people.  This requires a lot of resources and planning. 

 

Budget and Personnel – The City’s fiscal year ends on June 30^th.  This staff is closing out the fiscal year and preparing for the next.  

 

The Director informed the Commission that if the petitions that were turned in for the recall of the Supervisor in District 10 are validated, the recall election will occur after the November election.  Commissioner Mendelson asked the Director what would be the cost of the recall election.  Mr. Arntz responded that newspapers have estimated the cost at one million dollars, but he said the Department has no idea.

 

Commissioner Trasviña asked if the voting machines would be programmed to return ballots where no candidate is voted, so that a voter will be made aware and can decide whether to affirmatively not vote.  Mr. Arntz said that the machines can be programmed to reject a ballot if a race is under-voted.  Commissioner Trasviña clarified that this would presumably address a situation where a voter thinks he or she is writing in a candidate but did not correctly mark the ballot.  Would that vote come under the same protection?  Mr. Arntz said that it would if there were no other marks for that contest.

 

Commissioner Trasviña asked when would the certification of write-in candidates occur.  Mr. Arntz replied that the date is October 26.  The Commissioner asked if it would be too late to program the voting machines to return the ballot if no candidate is correctly voted upon.  Mr. Arntz said that the Department could set up testing where the machine would reject the ballot.  Mr. Arntz said that the voting machines are not currently programmed to do this because many people choose not to vote their entire ballot.  A lot of voters may vote just the Presidential contest.

 

Commissioner Townsend asked that this topic be covered more completely at a Commission Meeting before the November election.

 

 

4.         NEW BUSINESS

 

• (a)Discussion and possible action to approve the minutes for the Commission meeting of July 7, 2004.   Commissioner Mendelson MOVED and Commissioner Safire SECONDED the approval of the minutes.  Commissioner Trasviña presented minor corrections that the Commission Secretary reported she had reviewed and agreed to incorporate into the draft.  Motion CARRIED to approve the minutes with the additions presented by Commissioner Trasviña.

 

(b) Discussion and possible action to elect a Vice President of the

Commission.  President Townsend reminded the Commission that Vice President Tony Winnicker had resigned from the Commission and that the President had asked the members to consider a replacement candidate at the last Commission meeting.   President Townsend asked for nominations.  Commissioner Mendelson nominated Commissioner Eric Safire.  There were no other nominations.  The vote for Mr. Safire to become Vice President was UNANIMOUS.   

 

 

5.         Overview of the Voter Outreach and Education Programs.

 

(a) Presentation by Department of Elections.  Charles McNaulty gave a brief history of the Charter Amendment that passed in 2002 that established RCV for San Francisco and a presentation of the RCV outreach program.  He explained that the election this November will be the first time the method will be used in San Francisco.    In the past, voters could mark one candidate for office in local contests and if no candidate received more than 50 percent of the vote, the two candidates with the most votes would participate in a separate run-off election in December.  Ranked Choice Voting eliminates the need for a separate election by allowing a voter to choose three candidates in the order of the voter’s preference.  A candidate still needs more than 50 per cent of the votes to win.   He noted that RCV does not apply to members of the Board of Education or the Community College board, but does apply to all other City offices.  

 

Mr. McNaulty reported that paper ballots and the same optical scan eagle machines that the City has used since 2000 will be used for RCV in November.   The Voter Information Pamphlet (VIP) that is mailed to each registered voter before the election will contain a sample of the ballot used to select three candidates in order of preference.  The results of the election must be announced no later than 28 days after election day.

 

Mr. McNaulty explained that the Board of Supervisors approved an outreach plan for educating voters about RCV in July 2003.  Part of the plan is to distribute grants to community-based organizations who will assist the DoE in that effort.  The total amount to be shared by these organizations is $210,000. 

 

Twenty-Five Thousand dollars has been awarded for ethnic media outreach to limited English speaking voters.

 

Cecile Caterson has been selected as grant administrator.

 

Public Comment.  Mr. Herman said there is no mathematical certainty that, with just three choices, a candidate will get a majority of the votes cast.  Director Arntz explained that the candidate with the fewest votes received is eliminated and the voting goes to the next round where they are counted for the second choice candidate and then to the third round, if necessary until a remaining candidate gets a majority of the votes.  James Bryant asked if there will be a list of all the organizations who will be awarded grants.  Director Arntz answered that the contract negotiations should be completed next week.  

 

• (b)Presentation by Bouchard McElry Communications Group, a firm assisting the Department of Elections regarding Ranked Choice Voting education.  Anne Bouchard explained that her company has partnered with Elections Systems and Software for the outreach to educate voters about the RCV method.  She said her priorities were to inform the voters about how the method works, how it’s going to be administered and what to do when they get to the voting booth.  The company will be developing brochures, polling place posters and doing media outreach via radio, television and newspapers.

 

Mary Towne advised attendees that there were sample posters available on the information table for this meeting.  These posters will be printed in English, Spanish and Chinese.  Print advertisements will be showing up in newspapers in August.  Public Service Announcements in 30 second, 15 second and 10 second formats will be distributed to local radio and television station PSA Directors in September.  Voters will also be seeing bus panels on public transportation soon.

 

            Public Comment.  Speaker suggested that the community-based groups also be given press kits similar to those given to media to assist them in their outreach efforts.  President Townsend suggested that type size be increased in the informational materials so that seniors will be able to read it with less difficulty.  Speaker asked if there was some way to make presentations, which he found to be very dry, more interesting by using animation.   The speaker said he was planning to run a mock election in his apartment building using food requests which will be voting upon and the winning choices will be served as an example of ranked choice voting. 

 

 

ADJOURNED at 7:20 pm