Use of ranked choice in: City of St Paul, MN

Basics: How and when is used in this jurisdiction Year RCV was introduced 2011 How many RCV have 3 – 2011, 2013 and 2015 city general elections been held? Goal in introducing RCV? Approved by the voters in an initiated question, not proposed by the mayor or city council. You should contact Fairvote Minnesota to determine their objectives in the use of the ranked voting process in our city elections. Which voters? City of St Paul voters only What kind of ? City general election only Which offices? Mayor and council member only Voting rules for the offices? Voters may rank up to six candidates per office Are write-ins allowed? Yes and this can be one of the Type of preferential voting? Ranked choice voting Any special rules or aspects to the governing laws? Other comments

Ballot: How is the ballot designed and presented to voters What voting system(s) are General: Hart Verity Scan used in your jurisdiction? Accessible: Hart Verity Touch Writer Absentee/VBM: What is the ballot layout type Optical scan ballot with rectangular box targets for the general ballot? How are the RCV choices Normal optical scan ballot format – three vertical presented? columns, headed by the titles, “First Choice”, “Second Choice, if any” and so on. How many rankings are on the Voters may rank up to six candidates. ballot? How are RCV and other City elections are conducted concurrently with school contests mixed on the ballot? district elections. City offices are on one side of the ballot and school district offices are on the other side of the ballot. Limitations or constraints At present, our voting system does not have the imposed by the voting system? programming needed to reallocate votes electronically and the state has not certified any voting systems to do so. How do you handle language N/A requirements (if any)? How does your accessible Voters use a touchscreen to mark their ballot. The ballot work? What is different? result is the exact same ballot that other voters use, which is then inserted into the ballot counter. How does your absentee/VBM All our are the same, whether voted before or ballot work? What is different? on Election Day. Any big successes in the ballot We think the design has worked for the voters, because design? we are not seeing a higher rate of spoiled ballots in city elections compared to the state elections. Any big problems in the ballot No design? Any patterns in voting errors None that we can tell at this point. that you have noticed? Other ballot design comments None

Poll workers and voter education: what has worked well (or not) What is the biggest challenge The main task was to introduce the whole ranked you’ve had in training staff and voting process. The reallocation process was, of course, poll workers? new to us and our election judges. What’s one really successful We did two videos on the voting process and the thing you have done for poll reallocation process that worked out very well. worker training? What is the biggest challenge Introducing he different voting methodology to the you’ve had in voter education? public. What’s one really successful Producing the informational videos. thing you have done for voter education? Have you done any usability No testing or surveys of voters? Other comments on training None and voter ed

Election administration: how has RCV affected processes and tools How has the election It’s fair to say administration of a ranked voting administration process election is more complex than an election using the changed for RCV? traditional voting method. Ballot production has become a little more complex. Also, the reallocation process is new and used only in St Paul city elections, so has increased our work and extended our schedule for those elections. What is the biggest challenge To date, we have done all three reallocations manually, you’ve had in administering since we lack a system that is currently programmed to RCV elections? perform the reallocation electronically and lack the state certification to do so with our voting system. Any tools that are particularly None that are apparent so far. helpful in running an RCV election?

Reception: positives and complaints What has the overall reception The new voting method has been implemented without for RCV been? incident. Biggest complaint? The candidates would like to have the unofficial results of the election, including the reallocated vote totals, ready on election night. Biggest positives? Not sure at this point; all three elections so far have had low rates of voter participation. Any changes that you have Assuming we keep this voting methodology in the made or contemplate? future, it would be helpful to be able to reallocate votes electronically directly in the voting system. Anything else? No 7-14-16