Welcome! Please introduce yourself

Michael Niles here. Web developer and designer going on 12 years. Looking to ultimately get our election systems over the entrenched FPTP system that I feel bottlenecks us into an increasingly failed two party system that is easily gamed by corporate interests. Would love to eliminate the spoiler effect and tactical voting as much as possible, ultimately to empower the honest vote. Here to help in whatever way possible.

Hi, Sara Wolf here. My background is in sustainable farming, natural building and music. An overarching theme that keeps coming up in my life is the importance of system design and how pervasively it influences everything that follows. From Permaculture design to Architecture I think that design is the single most effective tool for creating real exponential change. I've been passionate about politics and activism my whole life. I believe that redesigning our electoral system is one of the most simple and obtainable ways to empower the people and that doing so is the keystone for all other issues and causes right now in history. Let's make it happen!

I'm advocating a cohesive national movement to use Ranked Choice Voting in all 50 states as soon as possible. We need to take a multi-pronged approach to get it underway for Presidential Elections as well as getting local elections on board too as soon as they're ready. I hope that Oregon can pass legislation that will can be a scaleable model for the rest of the country from the county level all the way to the top. I'm also advocating an initiative (perhaps all in one package with RCV?) that would pledge Electoral Collage (and superdelegate) votes to the winner of the National Popular Vote. Doing so would erode the electoral college's power one state at a time until it was irrelevant and it would bypass amending the constitution to do it! With one well drafted measure we could do away with strategic voting, the closed primary, gerrymandering and the electoral collage in a way that would benefit Democrats, Republicans and Independents.

With this as my main goal I've researched a number of voting systems and concluded that RCV is by far the best most achievable option. While there may be other options that have mathematical or logistical advantages RCV it's still really, really good and it's far and away the system with the most real world evidence and momentum behind it. Canada is in the process of implementing RCV and I'm hoping that when they do we will have the groundwork laid to launch RCV onto the national stage in the US.

On other fronts, I started the "Ranked Choice Voting" facebook page this year: https://www.facebook.com/rankedchoicevoting/ so I'd love it if you like it and use it in your outreach. Tag it in comments so that people who are unfamiliar can just click the link and learn what it is. I'd be stoked to have more people posting there and keeping it engaging and you all are welcome to help admin if you're inspired. I'm also getting involved with the local chapter of the Indivisible movement so hit me up if you are interested in that.

It's unfortunate that Loomio doesn't have a private messaging function. Please feel free to contact me at 971-222-9364 or with facebook messenger under Sara Wolf

Hi all, checking in. I'm a building science energy efficiency professional working with home builders to make homes more energy efficient and comfortable, and qualify them for various incentive and certification programs, including Energy Trust of Oregon incentives.

I've been interested in RCV since the 1990's and early 2000's when I was involved in local political campaigns via the Sierra Club and Oregon League of Conservation Voters. I used to be the Political Chair for the Sierra Club's Portland area Columbia Group, and also a member of the Oregon League of Conservation Voter's Multnomah County steering committee.

I appear to be one of the few Libertarian party members of this group. I used to be a Democrat but now I am registered Libertarian and consider myself to be a "Green Libertarian". Basically what this means is that I agree more with the Libertarian party on most issues than either the Democrat, Republican, or Green parties, and I agree with free market economics (not to be confused with corporatism or crony capitalism), but I actually care deeply about environmental issues and think polluters should be held liable and accountable for their pollution. However I think command and control government regulation is usually counter productive, and there are better ways to protect and restore the environment.

If you would like to hear more about this or debate me on this or any issues, just ask and maybe we can discuss over a beer or two!

Hi all. I'm a researcher at Sightline Institute, the Pacific Northwest's sustainability think tank. I used to work mostly on climate change policy, but now am working mostly on democracy reform. The three tenants of Sightline's democracy work are:
1. Every citizen should have a right to vote (and easily exercise it without having to jump through hoops or be turned away).
2. Every citizen should have an equal voice in elections (and not be drowned out by big money).
3. Every citizen should have an equal right to representation in government (each vote should count equally in achieving representation).

I've done a little bit of research on IRV, but I am mostly interested in proportional representation voting (STV, MMP, party list) for its potential to give more accurately represent the views of voters, to avoid partisan gridlock, and to craft lasting solutions with broad benefits.

Hello, I am a long time active PGP member and activist. Professionally, I'm a Certified Public Accountant with a strong background in systems, auditing, and data accumulation.

So, contact information! Because to talk with each other, first we have to find each other.

If you want RCV advocates to be able to find you, please reply on this thread with your name, contact info (preferably both email and phone), and anything else you consider relevant (e.g. committee memberships / positions). Remember this is public, so yes there could be spam etc. Also yes I’m deliberately crossposting between Facebook and Loomio, e.g. because some people won’t want to join one and some people won’t want to join the other.

A list of websites for RCV efforts in Oregon:
https://www.loomio.org/g/mlgtGHuy/rcv-oregon
https://www.facebook.com/groups/rcvoregon/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/RankedChoicePDX/ -- This isn't being used much; there have been only 3 new posts (and 15 replies) so far this year, and 2 of those 3 new posts are links to other RCV Oregon websites.
http://www.rcvoregon.org/
https://www.betterballotbenton.com/

Please add whatever I’ve missed! If you’re not sure about a website (e.g. do we include southwestern Washington?), go ahead and add it. Speaking of which, there’s also http://www.fairvote.org/, a national advocacy site for RCV and other electoral reforms.

Add http://www.equal.vote/ to your link list

I’ve been promoting RCV on and off for 19 years. My land line is 503777MATH. My email involves my first initial, my last name, the commercial domain “Hevanet”, and as little punctuation as possible.

I’m not currently on any committees but would like to join Outreach. Also I’m interested in lurking on any and all RCV Oregon email lists so please feel very free to add me.

I’d like to work with other RCV advocates to reach out to college student bodies, neighborhood organizations, and similar groups to help them use RCV. If you’d like to help, please contact me. Thanks!

I'm Bill Walter, a primary care doctor working in a community health clinic in Eugene. I'm very new to thinking through election mechanics, but am rapidly getting up to speed. My primary motivation post-11/8 is to be engaged in efforts to support electoral integrity, with electoral mechanic reform a second goal. As Oregon has fairly solid electoral integrity (minimal voter suppression, eg), I'm spending my energy right now on getting engaged on the second task.

Aaron -- As far as I’m concerned it’s the thread that serves as the link list, not my original comment. In other words you’ve added http://www.equal.vote/ yourself. Thank you! :smiley: No need to route everything through a single person. Plus I’m generally not a fan of editing posts or comments, since that can end up misleading people as to what was conversationally intended.