A new form of voting is making its debut in Redondo Beach.
For the March 4 city election – including races for mayor and city council seats – residents will use ranked-choice voting.
City Hall sent postcards in late January to educate the public about the system.
The central difference is that people vote not just for one candidate in a race, but for all of the candidates, ranking them from most preferred to least preferred.
When the votes are counted, if no candidate ends up with 50% + 1 vote – to win the election – then second choices are brought into the mix, then third, until someone has a winning majority. The contender with the least amount of votes in each counting round is eliminated.
Voters may rank as many candidates as they want or as few.
Second-choice votes only register if a voter’s top choice gets eliminated in the counting. Whoever voted for an eliminated candidate as their top choice will then have their second-choice drop in for the next round.
Write-ins are still allowed. Ranked-choice will not be used for Redondo Unified school board races, only city elections. ER
