California Ranked-Choice Voting Initiative (2020)
| California Ranked-Choice Voting Initiative | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Election date November 3, 2020 | |
| Topic Elections and campaigns | |
| Status Not on the ballot | |
| Type Constitutional amendment | Origin Citizens |
The California Ranked-Choice Voting Initiative (#19-0013) was not on the ballot in California as an initiated constitutional amendment on November 3, 2020.
The ballot measure was designed to enact ranked-choice voting, multimember districts for the state Senate, quota recalls for multimember districts, and citizen-initiated (through signature drives) special elections for legislative districts.[1]
Text of measure
Ballot title
The official ballot title was as follows:[2]
| “ |
Requires Ranked-choice Voting System For Federal And State Elections. Restructures State Senate To Multi-member Districts. Initiative Constitutional Amendment.[3] |
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Petition summary
The summary provided for inclusion on signature petition sheets was as follows:[2]
| “ |
Allows voters to rank all candidates in order of preference in Congressional, State Officer, and Presidential elections. If voter’s highest-ranked candidate is eliminated, then the vote (or a portion of it, in some instances) is transferred to the next continuing candidate, as specified. Repeats rounds of counting, elimination, and reallocation until winners are determined. Changes composition of state Senate from forty single-member districts to eight five-member districts. Changes petition procedures and requires ranked-choice voting for recall elections.[3] |
” |
Fiscal impact
The fiscal impact statement was as follows:[2]
| “ |
Increased state elections costs potentially totaling millions of dollars for every two-year election cycle. Increased local elections costs potentially totaling tens of millions of dollars for every two-year election cycle.[3] |
” |
Full text
The full text of the ballot measure is available here.
Path to the ballot
Process in California
In California, the number of signatures required for an initiated constitutional amendment is equal to 8 percent of the votes cast in the preceding gubernatorial election. Petitions are allowed to circulate for 180 days from the date the attorney general prepares the petition language. Signatures need to be certified at least 131 days before the general election. As the verification process can take multiple months, the secretary of state provides suggested deadlines for ballot initiatives.
The requirements to get initiated constitutional amendments certified for the 2020 ballot:
- Signatures: 997,139 valid signatures were required.
- Deadline: The deadline for signature verification was June 25, 2020. However, the process of verifying signatures can take multiple months. The recommended deadlines were March 3, 2020, for an initiative requiring a full check of signatures and April 21, 2020, for an initiative requring a random sample of signatures.
Signatures are first filed with local election officials, who determine the total number of signatures submitted. If the total number is equal to at least 100 percent of the required signatures, then local election officials perform a random check of signatures submitted in their counties. If the random sample estimates that more than 110 percent of the required number of signatures are valid, the initiative is eligible for the ballot. If the random sample estimates that between 95 and 110 percent of the required number of signatures are valid, a full check of signatures is done to determine the total number of valid signatures. If less than 95 percent are estimated to be valid, the initiative does not make the ballot.
Stages of this initiative
On August 20, 2019, Scott Mathog filed the ballot initiative.[1] On October 24, 2019, Attorney General Xavier Becerra (D) released ballot language for the initiative, which permitted a signature drive to begin. Signatures were not filed for the ballot initiative.
See also
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 California Attorney General, "Initiative #19-0013," August 20, 2019
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 California Secretary of State, "Initiatives and Referenda Cleared for Circulation," accessed October 24, 2019
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
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