Tacoma News Tribune recommends Rejection of Charter Amendment 3

The Tacoma News Tribune has decided to recommend the rejection of Pierce County Charter Amendment 3. The News Tribune recommendation comes on the heals of the Seattle Times' recommendation of rejection and the League of Women Voter's similar position.

Of course, this website has endorsed the rejection of Charter Amendment 3 as well. This amendment was hastily put on the ballot by a county council looking to reduce competition in their runs for re-election. We encourage voters to examine the Protect Voter Choice website to make informed decision on this issue.

British Prime Minister Considering Shift to Ranked Choice Voting

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is considering shifting the UK election system to be like the Pierce County Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) system.

Brown is pondering putting such a shift in election systems on the next national ballot. The British "first past the post" system is viewed as being quite unfair to opposition parties such as the Liberal Democrats. The Labor Party is considering such a change since they are concerned about becoming a minor party given their current standings in the polls.

The British are looking at the experiences of the Australian system (called alternative vote system) which is called Ranked Choice Voting in Pierce County, Washington.

Paul Jacob urges No vote on Pierce County Charter Amendment 3

Paul Jacob, President of Citizens in Charge, criticizes local politicians for attempting to repeal Ranked Choice Voting in Pierce County. Jacob, a long time proponent of term limits, also urges a No vote on the term limit extension charter amendment.

While many of the proponents of RCV are from the liberal/progressive side of the political spectrum, Jacob clearly does not fit into that category. While Jacob is an idealist, he is viewed as more of a conservative than a liberal. And, now in the Pierce County debate on term limits, he is on the same side as Bill Baarsma. I guess RCV and term limits make for unusual bedfellows.

Political Leaders in Minnesota Rally for Ranked Choice Voting

FairVote Minnesota held a fundraising event for Ranked Choice Voting attended by 200 people last night. Many prominent politicians attended the event.

Minneapolis will be using RCV in electing its city level officials in November, 2009. This will be the first use of RCV in the state of Minnesota. In addition, Fair Vote Minnesota is striving to get the cities of St. Paul and Duluth to use RCV to elect their city level officials.

Minnesota clearly has more forward-looking politicians than the sitting politicians in Pierce County. Many Pierce County politicians do not seem to see the benefits of Ranked Choice Voting.

Pierce County should let ranked-choice voting stand

There have been a series of media pieces about the proposed charter amendment to repeal Ranked Choice Voting in Pierce County. Today, the Seattle Times editorial opines that Pierce County should let Ranked Choice Voting stand.

"The Pierce County Council should stop trying to kill its constituents' chosen election system, ranked-choice voting. Voters embraced ranked-choice voting by a vote and then rejected a subsequent attempt to kill it. Let the voters have their way."

In addition, the League of Women Voters in Tacoma-Pierce County opined in favor of keeping RCV. The Daily Weekly and KUOW also had pieces on the controversy.

Much of the coverage suggests that RCV should be kept to improve voter choice. Of course, many of the opponents assert that voters are confused by "too many candidates on the ballot". This "too many candidates on the ballot" argument is primarily put forth by establishment politicians who want to discourage voter choice.

Ranked Choice Voting in Vermont

February 12, 2009
HOW INSTANT RUNOFF'S WORKING IN VERMONT

Terry Bouricius is a former city councilor and state legislator from Vermont

Terry Bouricius, Fair Vote - Here in Burlington, the second mayoral election using instant runoff voting is less than three weeks away. There is a spirited campaign with five candidates, four of whom are seen as having a serious chance of winning.

The incumbent mayor from the Progressive Party, Bob Kiss, is running for re-election. His opponents are the current president of the city council, Republican Kurt Wright, Democratic councilor Andy Montroll (a past city council president), Dan Smith, an independent whose father was a Republican Member of Congress and who is running as a "post-partisan" "entrepreneurial" candidate, and a political novice, Green Party candidate James Simpson.

Under the old city charter, Burlington would likely be looking at a runoff election a few weeks later (with the desperate flurry of campaign fund-raising, mud-slinging, and added tax-payer expense that generally entails). However, with the ranked-choice ballot, Burlington will finish its mayoral election on March 3.

With plurality elections, candidates on the same side of the political spectrum, who appeal to the same slice of the electorate, often seek to demonize each other. Again, this dynamic is absent under IRV.

Because candidates know they may need the second choices from voters who support other candidates as their top pick, the campaigns are remaining civil, and attempting to reach out to a broader constituency, than would be typical in a plurality election. A door-knocker for one of the campaigns recently knocked on our door, and had a conversation with my wife. When told that we were supporting one of the other candidates, this campaign worker said, "I can see that your mind is made up, but I hope you'll look over this leaflet and consider giving my guy your second choice."

Ranked Choice Voting on Ballot Again in Pierce County

This is a piece by Krist Novoselic which appeared in the Daily Weekly.

The Pierce County Council has put Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) on the ballot with the intention that voters will approve its repeal.

I defended the system on KUOW this morning.

In the same radio interview, Pierce County auditor Jan Shabro complained about the extra work and cost of Ranked Choice. At first blush, this might be a concern to taxpayers. However, Ms. Shabro failed to mention the cost of the extra ballot for the August Top-Two primary election.


But these are the status quo talking points - RCV is expensive.

It could be a fair proposition to put this election reform in front of voters again if there were a reasonable assessment before hand. But Pierce County political insiders rushed RCV on the ballot even though there's a credible study of the system in progress. There also needs to be an objective fiscal audit of RCV in comparison with Top-Two elections.

Like I say in the interview - elected leadership hope RCV will wither on the vine. Lawmakers like no-contest or uncontested elections. Competitive elections are a threat to politics-as-usual.

The Seattle Times Ed cetera Blog has another piece on the repeal effort.

RCV, also known as Instant Runoff Voting is in the Los Angeles Times.

Pierce County Voting System Under Fire

This is a piece from KUOW's website.

Pierce County voters approved the use of ranked–choice voting in 2006. It was seen as a victory for progressives and as an interesting experiment. But the Pierce County Council is now asking voters whether they want to pull the plug. The council voted this week to let voters choose whether to do away with the system.


Instant runoff voting, or ranked–choice voting as it's also called, gained some popularity in the wake of Ralph Nader's third party candidacy in 2000. It was seen as an alternative to "spoilers" and "wasted votes" because voters can list their first, second and third choices. If their first choice — perhaps a third–party candidate — loses, then their vote goes to their second choice candidate.

Former Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic now chairs the organization FairVote, which advocates ranked–choice voting around the country. He says the system leads to more people running, and more issue–oriented elections. But he says Pierce County politicians seem threatened by the change.

Novoselic: "There's no leadership at all with ranked choice voting in Washington state; I don't know any lawmakers who are coming out and defending it, so it's kind of like, 'let it wither on the vine.'"

He says politicians should defend the system and iron out the wrinkles. Meanwhile, Pierce County administrators say the new system has been a headache.

Shabro: "Last year, it just about doubled our election costs to have it in the general election. We had to have two separate ballots which in itself causes an increase in postage."

That's Pierce County Auditor Jan Shabro. The county issued one ballot for the races using ranked choice voting, and one for the rest. That added $1 million to election expenses, apart from one–time costs. And officials say the majority of comments from voters have been negative, that it's confusing. But advocates say ranked–choice voting gave voters more choices, for example in the race for Pierce County Executive.

Richard Anderson–Connolly is a professor at the University of Puget Sound. He says voters can choose who they want, instead of the lesser of two evils.

Anderson–Connolly: "Four strong candidates, no spoilers, no vote splitting even though there were two Democrats. In the early rounds, those votes went to their first choices but then they came back together in the later rounds. And you did it all in one election, you didn't have to go through weeding out some people in August."

Anderson–Connolly says most voters aren't paying attention to the August primary, so it's better to just have all the candidates on the November ballot. That's how ranked choice voting works. He predicts a vigorous campaign before Pierce County voters pass judgment on the new system this November.

Amy Radil, KUOW News.

© Copyright 2009, KUOW

Auditor's Survey flawed

Editor's Note

The Pierce County Auditor's office's survey of voters on Ranked Choice Voting was flawed and biased for many reasons. Read below for an academic analysis of the survey.


By Professor Richard Anderson-Connolly
University of Puget Sound

Given the very low response rate for the opinion poll on Ranked Choice Voting conducted by the auditor it is unwarranted to claim, as in the News Tribune headline of December 6, that a majority opposes RCV. We would need much better data to assess this claim.

Every voter received a poll about RCV along with his/her ballot. Thus the total number of possible respondents was 333,824. Of those 90,738 were returned making a response rate of only 27%. As a rule of thumb the sociologist and methodologist Earl Babbie (2005) suggests that “a response rate of 50% is adequate for analysis and reporting. A response of 60% is good; a response rate of 70% is very good.” The auditor’s rate was barely half the minimum standard and thus the findings do not legitimately deserve analysis and reporting.

The problem with such a low response rate is the strong possibility of nonresponse bias. “If the response and nonresponse strata were randomly formed, the respondent and nonrespondent means would be equal in expectation, and there would be no nonresponse bias. In practice, however, it is dangerous to assume that the missing responses are missing at random; indeed there are often good grounds from believing otherwise” (Kalton, 1983). In other words, if those who returned their RCV poll differ on average from those who did not respond, then the data are biased.

This situation seems very likely. It is plausible that those who did not return their surveys may feel less strongly about the topic, at least on average. Or maybe they were busier and had less time to fill it out. Or maybe they had the time but were just lazier. Or maybe they were more suspicious about government polls. Who knows? The groups could differ in many ways, including ways we might not even imagine, but the standard scientific approach is to put the burden of proof on those reporting the data to demonstrate that there are not likely to be any systematic differences when the response rate is this low. In science skepticism is a virtue. While I do not expect the auditor or the newspaper to follow this convention some recognition of the limitations resulting from the very low response rate would have been proper.

A more accurate reporting of the data would be the following:
72.8% No response
17.0% Negative view toward RCV
8.7% Positive view toward RCV
1.4% Undecided on RCV

Given that almost three-quarters of voters did not return the survey we clearly can not claim the majority oppose RCV. Recognizing that we have no comparable data on the popularity of the Top-2, the survey findings offer almost no guidance on future policy. More time and better data are needed.

In addition to the extremely low response rate the auditor’s poll on RCV has an additional problem involving sponsorship. The auditor almost certainly biased the data by including her name on the survey, which was given even more attention when it created something of a controversy in the news as a possible ethical violation. The percentage of those responding who had a negative view of RCV was close to the percentage of voters who had someone other than Pat McCarthy as their first choice for executive (and the percent that liked RCV was close to the percent that put Pat first).

Groves and Peycheva (2008) observed: “Sponsors of the survey are often policy-makers or advocates for the topics of the surveys they sponsor (e.g., companies conduct customer satisfaction surveys and manage the service delivery with customers). When the sample persons judge that the sponsor has an identifiable ‘point of view’ on the survey topic, that viewpoint can influence the person’s decision. Sample persons who have prior connection with the sponsor are most likely to experience these influences. For survey variables that are related to that point of view, nonresponse bias can result.”

By putting her name on the survey did the auditor make the RCV poll into something of a referendum on herself? It’s impossible to estimate the strength of the bias but certainly this was bad polling practice (regardless of the ethics) and compounds the nonresponse bias.

Given the poor quality of the data we do not know how many voters in Pierce County were satisfied, dissatisfied, or didn’t feel strongly either way about RCV. But as an advocate of RCV I am willing to admit that much more should have done to explain to voters the advantages to the new system. Although it would be possible to dismiss this as anecdotal evidence I have heard a few people say that they didn’t know what the “point” was to RCV. In the absence of good reasons to change I can understand why many voters would say they want to go back to something more familiar.

To give RCV a fair chance, advocates, the media, and auditor’s office should communicate to the voters not merely the mechanics of ranking or the counting algorithm but also the “whole point” to the change: more choices for voters, one election instead of two, and no spoilers, wasted votes, or vote-splitting. Once voters get the point then it would make sense to talk about the relative advantages and disadvantages of RCV versus the Top-2 or some other system. The calls for immediate repeal are occurring in an environment filled with ulterior political scheming by powerful interests and devoid of reliable information regarding the true wishes of the public.

Report on Ranked Choice Voting in San Francisco

In the San Francisco Chronicle, Steven Hill writes:

"What are you doing today? How would you like to be voting in runoff elections for the Board of Supervisors? That's what many would be doing if San Francisco hadn't voted in 2002 to replace the old December runoff system with an "instant runoff" system known as ranked choice voting.

Whether using ranked choice voting or December runoffs, the goal is the same: to elect officeholders with majority support from the public. But with ranked-choice voting, you accomplish this in one November election.

We now have had five elections since 2004 using ranked-choice voting to elect the mayor, Board of Supervisors and other offices, providing some basis for assessing its impact. One significant difference between ranked choice and the old December runoff has been a dramatic increase in voter turnout. By finishing the election in November when voter turnout tends to be highest (because voters are showing up to vote for president or governor), a lot more San Franciscans are having a say in who represents them on the Board of Supervisors.

For example, this year in the District Three race, 22,407 voters participated in the final round of the instant runoff, with the winner of that race having 13,316 votes. In the December 2000 runoff election to decide the same District Three seat, only 12,414 voters participated, with the winner garnering 7,202 votes. Voter turnout dropped by 40 percent between the November 2000 election and the December runoff, and surely would have done the same this year following a high turnout presidential election."

For more, see here.

Georgia Mess Points Out the Need for Ranked Choice Voting

The Georgia US Senate race is showing the problems with their election system. The voters and taxpayers of Georgia are going to have a run-off election since no candidate received a majority of the votes in November.

James Wiseman writes:

"The U.S. Senate race in Georgia is going to a runoff Dec. 2, because the Libertarian candidate, Allen Buckley, got just enough votes to prevent either the Republican Saxby Chambliss or the Democrat Jim Martin from getting a majority.

Georgia voters, many of whom waited in line for hours to cast their ballots, will have to go back to vote again. The runoff is an extra expense for a state government that is already in a budget crisis, and a serious inconvenience for every voter who will have to somehow find the time for another trip to the polling place. Many will be unable or unwilling to vote again, which means that the results will reflect the desires of a smaller proportion of the original voting population.

The problem with our voting system is obvious. On Nov. 4, each voter was asked for his or her first choice for senator. Why make us come back a month later to ask us again? Why not ask us for our first and second choices on Election Day? In the Senate race in Georgia, no one got a majority. Since Buckley came in last, he would be eliminated, and each of Buckley’s voters’ ballots would be switched to their second choices. It is exactly what happens in a runoff, except that it is done immediately, without forcing us to hold another election."

The situation in Georgia shows one of the reasons why many people throughout the country are considering a system such as the ranked choice voting system in Pierce County, Washington.

Minnesota Senate Race Shows Benefits of Ranked Choice Voting

The US Senate race in Minnesota is a mess. This mess is in no small part due to the plurality voting system used in electing Senators in Minnesota and elsewhere around the country. Ranked Choice Voting (or as it is known in Minnesota Instant Runoff Voting (IRV)) would have improved the Senate race in Minnesota.

David Durenberger writes in the Minneapolis Star Tribune:

"We all were hoping that the bruising and expensive race for the U.S. Senate seat would end on Election Day.

Instead, the $40 million-plus campaign continues to permeate our headlines and limit our forward momentum. The Coleman-Franken race is now in a contentious recount and is almost certainly headed to the courts from there. The recount and its aftermath will be a protracted and high-priced affair, and no matter the outcome, most voters will be left wondering if there is not a better way to express our preferences.

Instant-runoff voting (IRV) would have produced an entirely different election."

Minnesotans would have been better off. Residents of Pierce County have had the benefit of adopting such a system for county level elections. This year's set of RCV elections went well and many voters are hoping this positive election reform will spread throughout the states of Washington and Minnesota.

Don't Scapegoat Ranked Choice Voting

Several leaders of the Democratic Party in Pierce County have been using Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) for a scapegoat for their poor performance in local elections results. Instead of taking responsibility for the poor local campaigns, these folks want us to focus our attention on the good government reform of RCV.

In "Don’t let critics scapegoat ranked choice," Peter Callaghan writes:

"Ranked choice voting causes antibiotic-resistant strep infections.

Is it a coincidence that until Pierce County switched to ranked choice voting, the economy was doing great?

Ranked choice voting lost the Sonics and is responsible for the Mariners losing 100 games.

Don’t even bring up global warming.

Oh, and ranked choice voting is to blame for every problem associated with the 2008 election, especially but not exclusively in Pierce County.

Long lines at the polls? A glacially slow vote count that would make Nigeria proud? The candidate you voted for losing? Ranked choice voting.

Is it any wonder that many elected officials and party brass have set their sights on an experimental voting system that has had all of one chance of succeeding? Scapegoats are wonderful things. Everyone agrees that none of the problems are their fault; they put all of the blame on something else and then hold a ritual sacrifice."

These Democratic Party leaders do not want members of the party to focus on their loss of a State Senate seat, a State Representative seat and a County Council seat. They want to switch the subject. These people should be working on their message for voters, not the election system.

Pastor Elected Pierce County Sheriff

Appointed Pierce County Sheriff Paul Pastor won his first election as Sheriff yesterday. While he had two opponents (R. P. Kollu and Jesse Hill) in the race, he received over 70% of the first choices in preliminary results. We see no reason for this to change.

In 2006, a charter amendment to the Pierce County charter made the Sheriff's position an elected position. This is the first election under that amendment.

Historic Ranked Choice Voting Election in Pierce County

Pierce County voters are about to participate in an historic Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) election for county officials. Voters will have more choices and will be able to order their choices. Voters will be able to choose the person, not the party, if they want to do so. RCV ensures that we get majority winners in each election. It is an exciting path-breaking event in our history.

More Choices When It Matters

In the race for Pierce County Executive, voters will have four solid candidates from whom to choose. The Assessor-Treasurer race has six candidates. The Sheriff and District #2, County Council races have three candidates each in them. This is in stark contrast to the state level elections where there will be only one or two candidates on the ballot.

There are more third party and independent candidates on the November ballot than the rest of the state combined. Independent voters in North Tacoma will have Ken Paulson as a choice for County Council. Mike Lonergan is running as a third party candidate for County Executive.

Vote Your Heart

In these races, voters will be allowed to list their first, second and third choices. In the County Executive race, if you love candidate A, like candidate B, can live with candidate C and loath candidate D, you, as a voter, can list A as your first choice, B as your second choice and C as your third choice. No need to worry about throwing the race to candidate D. No need to settle for second or third best, because "they have the best chance to win." Vote your heart in these ranked choice elections.

Majority Winners

In a RCV election, if one candidate receives a majority of the first choice votes, then that candidate is the winner. If no candidate receives a majority of the first choice votes, then the candidate with the fewest first choices is eliminated and those votes are allocated based on the voters' second choices.

If after this allocation a candidate has a majority of the votes, that candidate wins. If not, repeat the process until one candidate has a majority. This process ensures a majority winner and prevents candidates from winning with less than a majority of the voters supporting that candidate.

Remember to Fill Out the Separate Ballot

This will be the first November election with more than one ballot card in Pierce County. Be sure to fill out both the traditional ballot card and the Ranked Choice Voting card and return both in the envelope.

Make sure you read the voters' pamphlet for the instructions. The Elections Department has done a good job of explaining how to fill out your ballot for these races.

Participate in History

This RCV election is, by far, the largest implementation of RCV in a partisan election in the US. Have fun with it. Vote your heart. People throughout the country see Pierce County as a leader in election reform. And you get to participate.

Release RCV vote results sooner, not later

This editorial appears in the Tacoma News Tribune today.

According to the Pierce County voter’s pamphlet, “the world will be watching” to see how ranked-choice voting is handled here when it is used for the first time in the state of Washington.

It looks like the world will have to hold its breath and wait – along with Pierce County voters and the candidates in the four county races affected: executive, assessor-treasurer, sheriff and County Council District 2.

After the polls close Nov. 4, the auditor’s office will release an immediate tally of how many first-place votes each candidate receives as well as updated first-place votes each day as more ballots are counted.

But it won’t release the number of second- and third-place votes each candidate gets, and it won’t apply the algorithm that allocates those second- and third-place votes – and determines the winner – until the Friday after the election.

Even though the computer software being used on the RCV ballots apparently quickly tabulates and updates the results, Auditor Pat McCarthy says it makes sense to wait until most ballots have been received. A memo from her to the candidates states that applying the RCV algorithm earlier than Friday on a smaller number of ballots “would unnecessarily increase the risk of the appearance of fluctuating results.”

But voters are familiar with fluctuating results. They’ve seen the lead in close races tip back and forth between candidates over the course of days, even weeks. (Remember the wild 2004 gubernatorial race?) Voters understand that the count can change as more ballots arrive in the days after the election.

Even if the auditor’s office doesn’t apply the computer algorithm that determines the final winner, the very least it should do is release a daily tally of all the votes, not just the first-place votes. That way voters can see what’s going on in almost real time. And it would help dispel suspicion that anything untoward might be going on in the auditor’s office.

That’s no small consideration. McCarthy is a county executive candidate whose race is one of those on the ranked-choice voting ballot. And she’s already raised some hackles by putting a survey on ranked-choice voting in the ballot that included a signed note. If anything, she should bend over backwards to increase transparency in her office’s proceedings.

Dave Seago: Release all elections results on Election Day

Dave Seago (in a posting on the Tacoma News Tribune editorial blog) has called for the Pierce County Elections Department to release all election results at the same times. In particular, Pierce County Auditor Pat McCarthy announced her department intends to wait until Friday evening to release the preliminary results on county level elections.

"McCarthy currently plans to release on election night only the totals of first-place rankings candidates receive in the RCV contests. These include races for county executive, County Council, sheriff and assessor.

I don't think it makes any sense for the auditor to arbitrarily release only part of the preliminary results on election night. Voters understand full well that first-night results can change, especially after enduring the aftermath of the 2004 governor's race in Washington.

And because McCarthy herself is a candidate for county executive, she needs to avoid any possible perception that she would be privy to the full results before other candidates and the public.

McCarthy needs to be purer than Caesar's wife at this point. That means releasing all the results, right away.

The Washington Coalition for Open Government (I'm a board member), state Auditor and former Pierce County auditor Brian Sonntag, and RCV proponents agree on that score.

In following discussion, "ballot image file" refers to a computer file that contains all the information from voter ballots used to determine the results of the RCV election. The file includes each voter's rankings of the candidates in each RCV race."

State Auditor Brian Sonntag says:

"If returns are available .... and being published .... how do you NOT
publish ALL you have?"

The Pierce County Auditor's office should release results for ALL races on Tuesday night.

Ranked choice voting improves voters’ say in outcomes

Below is an excerpt from an oped article by Richard Anderson-Connolly and Kelly Haughton in the Tacoma News Tribune.

"Pierce County voters are participating in record numbers in a historic ranked choice voting (RCV) election with more choices and more security than any previous election.

RCV is simply better than the top two, the system used for statewide offices. It’s more efficient, more democratic and more secure. (For a description of RCV, see The News Tribune’s front-page article Oct. 12 or visit the auditor’s Web page.)

RCV produces a majority winner in one election, not two. Top two is just another term for a two-round runoff. The primary election reduces the choices, and the second picks the winner."

Blogger likes Ranked Choice Voting

A local blogger writes about his voting experience with Ranked Choice Voting (RCV).

"The weird thing was that our local elections were “ranked voting.” This forced me to actually look at all the candidates and really figure out who to put in the second and third slots. Basically, we all vote for our top three in order and the winner is the one that eventually gathers the most moss, er, votes as everything lumps together. In Washington we hate parties because we are founded on the grange system…the grandfather of the caucus kind of, I guess. We just don’t want to tell anyone what “party” we are, and then we have gone all the way to the Supreme Court to keep from having to do such a silly thing. The idea is that I can participate in the process for both parties, as long as I vote for one candidate one time. That’s about as simple as I can put it.

I really liked the ranked-choice voting. It did make me read more and make a few more phone calls before I filled out the ballot."

Pat McCarthy defiled polls by signing letter

by Peter Callaghan. The News Tribune. Tacoma, Wash.: Oct 23, 2008. pg. B.1
Full Text (655 words)
(Copyright (c) 2008 The News Tribune)

It wouldn't be a real Pierce County election without some Shameless Self-Promotion using tax dollars.

County Council members being "interviewed" on the government cable channel. Creative name-dropping in the voters pamphlet. Mailed invitations to town hall meetings in the middle of campaign season.

Call it SSP, the incumbents' edge.

But until now the promotion had stopped short of the polling place and its current equivalent, the vote-by-mail envelope. Not anymore.

Inside each ballot packet is a survey addressed to "Dear Voter." It asks them to fill out a short survey explaining how they feel about the new ranked-choice voting system. It's signed "Pat McCarthy Pierce County Auditor."

In case you vote-in-person folks are feeling left out, the same survey will be handed out at each polling place.

The idea is not just to gauge voter opinion. When she used a similar survey to ask people about the "top two" primary in 2004, it kept angry voters from writing nasty messages on the ballots themselves. McCarthy, who wasn't on the ballot that election, used the information when she testified to state legislators about unhappiness with top two.

All this would be fine, of course, except for one thing. McCarthy is in the midst of a close campaign for county executive. Her last-minute boost in name identification has the other candidates complaining.

McCarthy says she is the auditor and it's her job to do things like this. And state elections supervisor Nick Handy has her back, saying he sees nothing wrong with it.

Since the survey was done in the spirit of gaining understanding, let me try to explain to Mrs. McCarthy and Mr. Handy what's wrong with it.

The ballot envelope is the polling place. It should be an electioneering-free zone just as polling places are, by law. Try walking into a polling place with a Barack Obama T-shirt or a John McCain button. The election workers are supposed to tell you to take it outside until the button is gone or the shirt is covered.

Would such passive campaigning change the result of the election? Probably not. But after months and months of loud and often nasty campaigning, Washington state thinks the ballot place should be a sanctuary of sorts. And the last thing we need is a competition where each side must match the polling-place-by-polling-place campaigning of the other.

We have grown cynical. We roll our eyes when elected officials use their office to get their name out there. But McCarthy has shown great restraint, at least since being elected herself and especially when compared to her predecessor. When Cathy Pearsall-Stipek had her name in the voters pamphlet five times and her picture three times, it meant only one thing - she wasn't on the ballot that year. If she was, the number would be higher.

When McCarthy was Pearsall-Stipek's deputy, McCarthy's name was plastered in the pamphlet and on mailings as she was preparing to replace her boss, who was term-limited.

But the current voters pamphlet has her name listed just once, other than in the section on county executive candidates and an explanation of how to mark ballots where she has equal billing to Shawn Bunney, Mike Lonergan and Calvin Goings.

Well done, I thought. Voters will be sensitive enough this year given McCarthy's role in counting the ballots and declaring a winner. Why
give them more cause for suspicion?

Then came the mailed ballots.

McCarthy claims she has the right to put her name on materials like this. Maybe she does. But the County Council required that no names appear on ranked choice voting informational materials, and this should count.

There's a difference between what elected officials can do and what they should do. The survey would be fine without her name, so I can conclude only that the reason to include it was self-promotion in a close campaign.