[EM] electing a variable number of seats

[Charlie DeTar]

Howdy,

I'm on the board of a small non-profit, and have been tasked with
revising the portion of the bylaws that defines how to elect the board
of directors.  Having had some exposure to better election methods
through a colleague, I'm interested in exploring how we might use a
ranked voting system effectively.  Most of the methods I've seen,
however, are intended for electing a single winner -- and for the board
of directors, we have multiple seats.  Additionally, the number of seats
is variable.

I'm looking for methods that would more or less "optimally" (by variable
definitions of optimal) elect a variable number of people.  "Single
Transferable Vote" seems to be the most talked-about multi-winner ranked
system; but the vote transfer process requires a pre-defined number of
seats to fill.  It seems like the option to have a variable number of
seats opens up possibilities for improving representation by adding a
winner, or eliminating polarizing candidates by removing one.

Thoughts?

best,
Charlie