How The UES Should Approach Ranked-Choice Voting [Opinion]

Fellow Upper East Siders,

Upper East Side and Roosevelt Island voters, we need to talk. In just a few days we have a primary election that will — because of our overall partisan registration rates — all but determine the winner in our fall general election. While most coverage is on the mayoral race, we have a collective decision to make about who ought to represent our district, District 5, at the City Council.

Ben Kallos has reached the term limit for this office, leaving an open field. In the summer of 2020 six community members had declared their candidacies, many of whom had served on Community Board 8, the most local of local government here on the Upper East Side. By the winter of 2020 two more people jumped in the race and one of the originals had dropped out.

As an involved resident and political science professor, I dug in to learn as much as I could about the candidates and by the end of summer I was really impressed with our field. I was grateful that we had so many people who had decided to take their sense of service to the next level. I was also extraordinarily happy to see that the field had deep roots in the local governance and activism of the Upper East Side. However, as the campaign season wore on I realized that there is a feature about this election that makes getting to know the differences between candidates harder than in the past.

This primary election will be different than any we’ve had before. This time voters will be asked to provide up to 5 of their Ranked Choices when voting. Rather than just picking a single, favorite candidate each voter can select up to 5 candidates and note who is their first, second, third, fourth, and fifth pick.

Related coverage: Here's Where The Upper East Side Candidates Stand On Your Issues

Advocates of ranked-choice voting systems argue that these frameworks provide more “positive” elections because every candidate knows if they can’t be a voters first choice, they’d like to be considered for second and are thus dissuaded from “going negative” against perceived leading candidates. This seems to be true at least in District 5 — our race has remained cordial, with many of the candidates willing to compliment the others and politely ask to earn support as a number 2 choice if someone has already determined they like another candidate better for the top spot.

While this collegiality feels better to voters, in some ways we know less about our candidates. If no campaign is willing to “go negative” or point out something problematic about other candidates, voters are left to figure out who is who by only learning about candidates individually, versus contrasted to one another like we are more used to. This means we as voters need to do our best to figure out who we want for this seat and who we don’t. If you have a top pick, that’s great: rank them first and then really think about who else you’d want for this seat and about who you don’t. If you have someone you absolutely do not want, make sure to rank four other candidates after your top pick, as that will ensure a distributive rollover that benefits any candidate other than your least favorite.

Heading into the home stretch means that we are all going to get blanketed by mailers and ads. Despite city matching funds for this election, candidates who are backed by wealthier people or groups, even from those outside of the district will be given additional “support” by what’s known as “independent expenditure” advertising. That is advertising that’s not done by or coordinated by a campaign, but done in support of or opposed to a candidate. New York City is better than some other places about transparency in these advertisements and requires that the top three individual donors to a given group be listed in each advertisement.

In addition to researching candidates on your own, if you receive an independent expenditure ad in the mail or via e-mail, go that extra step and simply type the name of the three largest donors into your browser and learn a little more.

This is our first time getting to use the new Ranked Choice Voting system. As an Election Day worker I am looking forward to letting people know that they now have more of a say in what happens in our elections.

But before we get to our voting window — June 12-20 for in-person early voting and June 22 for Election Day voting — please make sure to do your research and come into the ballot box with a list of candidates you like. We’ve got a pretty great thing going on the Upper East Side, and as we look to select our newest council member, having a choice that a majority supports can help us emerge from this difficult time in the best way possible.

–Lindsey Cormack, Upper East Side resident

Read more coverage of the District 5 race:

• Here's Where The Upper East Side Candidates Stand On Your Issues
• UES Council Candidates Face Off In Person: Important Takeaways
• Upper East Side City Council Race: Where Things Stand
• Upper East Side City Council Race: What Issues Matter To You?