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PRESENTATION
Alec Schierenbeck discusses election reforms to address low voter turnout
0:23:19
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3 min
Executive Director Alec Schierenbeck shifts to address New York City's low voter turnout.
He details issues such as declining participation, especially among minority communities and young people, and the exclusion of unaffiliated voters from primaries.
Proposed reforms include moving city elections to even years and opening the primary system.
- Low voter turnout is a pervasive problem, with a significant portion of the electorate, including over a million unaffiliated voters, often excluded or disengaged.
- Moving municipal elections to even years (e.g., presidential cycle) has significantly increased turnout in other cities like Phoenix and Baltimore and could save NYC $42 million biennially.
- Opening NYC's closed party primary system is suggested to increase turnout and make the electorate more representative, as supported by a recent Campaign Finance Board report.
- Open primaries could engage more young voters, as nearly half of unaffiliated voters are under 40.
Alec Schierenbeck
0:23:19
Next slide.
0:23:23
Although the commission was convened to look for first and foremost at housing and land use, as you know, the single largest, category of written testimony we have received respects our system of elections and methods to attempt to address the abysmal voter turnout in municipal elections.
0:23:41
Today, turnout is very low and has been on a slow and steady decline.
0:23:47
Turnout is especially low among minority communities, among young people, and people who are not registered with a major political party today are largely locked out of the most important elections because of a system of closed party primaries.
0:24:00
We have made recent and promising shifts.
0:24:05
New York in 2021, had its first election using ranked choice voting, and it has shown promising results so far in altering the conduct of our elections.
0:24:14
But turnout remains a pervasive problem.
0:24:17
Next slide.
0:24:19
One idea we have heard is to move New York City's elections from odd years where they're currently held and to sync them with even years, perhaps with the presidential cycle, where turnout is more than twice as high on average as our odd year, elections.
0:24:39
Evidence shows that municipalities that move to even year elections consolidated with a presidential cycle see big jumps in their turnout.
0:24:47
Phoenix saw its turnout jump from 21% to 77% by making this change.
0:24:52
Baltimore saw a jump from 13% to over 60% by making this change.
0:24:58
In addition to, increasing turnout, the IBO estimates that consolidating elections would save the city about $42,000,000 every two year two years, which is about the Department of City Planning's annual budget.
0:25:12
This change has been supported by the Independent Campaign Finance Board, the Brennan Center, Citizens Union, Common Cause, and others.
0:25:18
But, of course, this change would not just require a change to local law under state law.
0:25:22
It would also require a constitutional amendment, which is currently under consideration in Albany.
0:25:29
Next slide.
0:25:31
Another change would be to open up New York City's closed party primary system.
0:25:36
Today, more than 1,000,000 unaffiliated voters are excluded from primary elections.
0:25:41
Jurisdictions throughout The United States do it a little bit differently with top two, top four open primaries or what are called jungle primaries.
0:25:50
One notable proposal from Citizens Union would be to conduct an open primary in which all candidates and all voters may participate and then use ranked choice voting to determine the follow the top two candidates who could proceed to compete in a general election.
0:26:05
Recently, the independent, campaign finance board released a report noting that opening New York's closed primary system to unaffiliated voters would likely increase voter turnout and make the electorate more representative.
0:26:17
That report noted that unaffiliated voters are disproportionately young.
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Nearly half of all unaffiliated voters are 40.
0:26:23
More than a quarter are 30.
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And that research from around the country shows that allowing unaffiliated voter participation has yielded more demographically and politically representative voting populations.
0:26:35
It also, and I'm quoting, cites research showing that primary systems that are open to unaffiliated voters or entirely nonpartisan tend to result in higher voter turnout.
0:26:45
Next slide.