[EM] 02/02/02 - FWD - WA State IRV bill hearing to be webcast:

[Donald Davison]

02/02/02 - FWD -  WA State IRV bill hearing to be webcast:

  ----------- Forwarded Letter -------------
To: instantrunoff at yahoogroups.com
From: "brentalanwhite" <brent_white at hotmail.com>
Date: Thu, 31 Jan 2002 16:57:42 -0000
Subject: [instantrunoff] WA State IRV bill hearing to be webcast

Hi Folks,

Our IRV bills are making progress here in the Evergreen State!

We have three bills introduced for IRV, and two bills making their
way rapidly through the process to phase out punch cards.

SB 6322 / HB 2335 to decertify punch-card voting machines were
introduced at the request of our Republican Secretary of State, and
are receiving solid Democratic support.  (The Democrats have a one-
vote margin in both houses, and the governorship.)

SB 6345 would allow cities to do IRV.  Some charter cities are
already allowed to do so, but there are disagreements among lawyers
about whether all of them are allowed to do so.  The bill has the
full backing of the City of Vancouver, where a brilliant campaign by
John Gear got the voters of that city to adopt IRV as an option.  The
bill has four Democratic and three Republican sponsors.

SB 6562 / HB 2698 would implement IRV in partisan general elections.
SB 6562 has five Republican and two Democratic sponsors.  HB 2698 is
our first full-scale IRV bill to be introduced in the House, and has
a Democratic and Republican sponsor.

These bills were written to only affect the general election because
no legislator wants to touch our overwhelmingly popular blanket
primary.  The State Democratic and Republican committees are suing to
have the blanket primary declared unconstitutional.

Some legislators are using the case as an excuse to not consider any
election bills, and then react hastily when the blanket primary is
thrown out, by quickly passing the Louisiana Primary (in which the
top two candidates advance, regardless of party affiliation).  They
have the votes, so our job is to pre-empt them, lest we lose our
leverage to ever get IRV passed in Washington State.

HB 2698 is scheduled for a hearing next Thursday, February 7.  The
hearing will be webcast on TVW
(http://www.tvw.org/media/housecmtes.cfm?)  The hearing starts at
6:00 pm PST (9:00 pm EST).

Keep up the great work, everyone, everywhere!

Best,
Brent White
Coordinator,
The Coalition for Instant Runoff Voting in Washington
17544 Midvale Ave N  Ste 107
Shoreline, WA  98133
206-977-0450



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