City Council

City of Salem, Massachusetts “Know Your Rights Under the Open Meeting Law, M.G.L. c. 30A ss. 18-25 and City Ordinance Sections 2-2028 through 2-2033.” The City Council Committee on Government Services co-posted with the Committee of the Whole met in the Council Chamber on _January 15, 2026 _______________________ at _______6:00 PM_________ for the purpose of discussing the matters(s) listed below. Notice of this meeting was posted on __________________January 8, 2026_____________________ at _______6:26_ P.M.__________________ (This meeting is being recorded) ATTENDANCE GS: Turowski (chair), Varela, Flynn, King & Sydoriak (zoom)- COW: Merkl, Holappa, Davis, Hapworth. City – Simons (City Clerk), Rennard (City Solicitor) & Wellock (Assistant City Solicitor). Board of Registrars - Alexandra Pineros- Shields, Chair, & Donald Bates. Voter Choice Massachusetts – Greg Dennis. ABSENT WERE: COW: Smith & Prosniewski SUBJECT(S) #319 The City Solicitor to prepare a Home Rule Petition requesting authorization of the Massachusetts Legislature to amend the City Charter to provide for ranked-choice voting (RCV) in local elections. Turowski – We will start with a review of history of the discussion for Ranked-Choice Voting (RCV) from C. Varela. Varela – We have had many discussions regarding RCV, but I think we have found a pathway to start discussing language for the Home Rule Petition which is the first step to making a change. There is always a better way of doing things and I think this is the case with RCV. It could attract more candidates because every vote counts. If you didn’t get your first choice, you could potentially get your second choice. If you don’t get 51% of the vote, then that is not representative of the constituency in Salem. It shouldn’t be up to elected officials to decide how we vote. We are creating an order for our legal department to draft a Home Rule Petition (HRP) for RCV. Once the HRP is drafted, it is submitted to the state. If we get HRP approved by the state, then it goes to the voters to decide if we want RCV in Salem. If it is passed by the voters, then we start to implement it. Turowski – Now we will hear from Greg Dennis from Voter Choice MA to give us an overview of RCV and answer any questions we have on the topic. Greg Dennis – Policy Director – Voter Choice MA. What is ranked choice voting? Well, the problem we're trying to fix, the primary problem we're trying to fix with ranked choice voting is the problem of vote splitting. Say we're holding an election for favorite candy, and two candidates enter the race. Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and Candy Corn. Early polling shows about 60% prefer Reese's to candy corn, so it looks like the peanut butter cups will win handily. That is until a third candidate decides to enter the race; Reese's Minis. That's bad news for Reese's fans. Now the Reese’s votes are split. On election day, candy corn wins, with less than 50% of the vote. One prominent example from recent history is the mayoral race in Fall River in 2019. In the year prior, the mayor, Giselle Correa, mayor of Fall River, was arrested for wire fraud and false tax returns. As a result, there was an effort to recall him. A vote to see whether he would be removed from office. The recall was successful at 61% of the vote. However, that recall election was followed on the same ballot with an election to fill the vacant seat, and Correa didn't want to give up his seat and asked voters to vote for him for re-election to the seat he had just been recalled from. He won the election to fill his vacancy with only 35% of the vote. He only won re-election because his challengers split the vote with one another. In most elections in the U.S. today, there's no requirement that candidates win with a majority vote more than 50%. In Massachusetts, we very often see candidates winning with percentages in the 30s or 20s. This problem of vote splitting has several negative consequences. First, as we saw in the example, it means we may elect someone without majority support. It means voters sometimes feel pressured to vote for the lesser of two evils. They settle for one of the candidates they feel is electable, rather than the candidate they want. This threat of vote splitting causes prospective candidates to bow out of the race before it's even begun. Fewer candidates mean a less diverse candidate pool, means fewer campaigns, driving voter turnout, and campaigns are less welcoming inclusive and engaging than they could be. That is some of the things we're trying to fix with Ranked Choice Voting. So how does it work? In Ranked Choice Voting, you'd see only one ballot, regardless of the race. Filling out the ballot, where in this ballot, voters are asked to rank their candidates in order of preference, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc. Just one candidate in the first column, or if they want, mark a second choice in the second column, a third choice in the third column, as many or as few choices as they like. It doesn't matter how many seats we're filling, 1, 3, 4, the instructions and the ballot stay the same. To see how the votes are counted, we can look at a race between the four candidates on a ballot, Nathaniel, Elizabeth, Timothy, and Charlotte. We start by counting the choices in the first column, just the first choices. If there are 100 ballots and Nathaniel has 36 first choices, Elizabeth 24, Timothy 12, and Charlotte 28. Nathaniels in the lead, but with Ranked Choice, you can't win with only 36% of the vote. So instead, the count drops the last place candidate, that's Timothy. Everyone that voted for Timothy has their vote instantly count towards their next choice instead. And we continue to drop the last place candidate, and transfer those ballots until two candidates remain, and when only two are left, then one of the candidates are going to have more than 50% of the votes. What about multi-seat elections? Well, the first thing to observe in multi-seat elections is that if we keep this majority threshold, somebody must win more than 50%, we're only going to be able to elect one person, because only one person can get more than 50%. So, what we do for a multi-seat election is we lower the threshold to allow more candidates to be elected. It goes to 25% for a three-seat election, like for school committee, and 20% for a four-seat election, like for at-large City Council. Now, in addition, we expect that some candidates are going to receive more votes than that threshold. What do we do in that case? We don't want those extra votes to stay with that candidate and be wasted. The additional thing we add in multi-seat, in addition to lowering the threshold, is any surplus votes the candidate received are distributed to the next choices on the ballots counting for those candidates and distributed in a proportional way. One additional note about multi-seat is that bullet voting doesn't give you any advantage. I know in Salem elections today, some voters might be inclined to bullet vote, because it can, depending upon the circumstance, give you an advantage. There is no strategic advantage to bullet voting in ranked choice voting. Regardless of whether we're talking about single-seat or multi-seat, the task we're asking the voter to do remains the same; fill out a ranked ballot indicating your first, second, etc. choice, regardless of how many seats we're filling. We know from experience around the world, that voters can do this correctly. One additional thing in our proposal is that we're eliminating primary elections. That's what the Home Rule Petition does. We don't need them anymore. Ranked choice voting narrows the field automatically in a single election, so we don't need the primary election to narrow the field. Voter turnout in primary elections is much lower than the November election and they cost around $30,000-$50,000. We're sometimes asked about implementation concerns. Salem's new voting machines are fully compatible with Ranked Choice Voting. Salem will need the software package that goes with the machines. It would run about $12K for the first year, and about a tenth of the cost for the annual licensing costs each year after that. There would be a net cost savings with the elimination of primary elections. In Massachusetts, two cities use RCV today. There are 10 more cities that are working on home rule petitions to use RCV. Many states around the country use it in various forms and other countries use it, including Australia and Ireland. To summarize the proposal for Salem. Ranked choice voting for mayor and ward council, or for those single seats, would take place when there's at least 3 candidates in the race. If there's only one or two, you don't need to rank those options, you can just choose your one like you do today. Candidates need more than 50% to win. For multi-seat elections, you'd use rank- choice voting when there's more candidates than there are seats. It would be a 25% threshold for the 3-seat race and 20% threshold for the 4-seat race, and there would be no more primary elections. The benefits, to summarize, it ensures winners in those single-seat elections have majority support, it encourages a larger, more diverse candidate pool, saves money by eliminating primary elections, limits gamesmanship and the need to bullet vote. It also fosters more civil and positive campaigning, because when you have an incentive to reach out to supporters of your opponents, to earn their second or third choices, it changes how you engage. Turowski – I will open the floor to councilor questions. Under discussion. Flynn – Isn’t bullet voting pretty much the same thing as RCV, if someone only votes for one candidate instead of up to 4? Also, in the at large race where there are 4 candidates and you like two of them the same, how does a person choose between two candidates? Dennis – In RCV, your second choice doesn’t count until the vote for your first choice is decided. Currently, in multi-seat voting, your second or third vote can defeat your first choice because all the votes count the same. In the at large example, the person that likes two candidates the same, will have to decide as if they can only pick one and then the other will be their second choice. Merkl – The current voting system doesn’t encourage more candidates. Eliminating primary elections will cut down on the confusion. Davis – I think RCV will allow people’s opinion and voices to be expressed in a more expansive and comprehensive way. Saving the cost and resources for our city is another benefit. Hapworth – To clarify the process, this petition will go to the legislature and if it is approved, will we have a chance to revise the language? Varela – We must be careful on the language used to draft the HRP. This will allow the city solicitor to review the document and draft a HRP based on the language we have in the order. Once it is drafted, it will come back to the council to review. We need to decide the language to give a guide to our legal department so they can draft the HRP. We must decide if we want to include multi-seat elections which I think we should. The language in the order is like what other cities in MA and around the country is using in their HRP. I would like to hear what our Board of Registrars thinks of this idea and the language in the document that has been drafted for the city solicitor to move forward with the HRP. Pineros-Shields – 7 Bristol St. Chair, Board of Registrars – I feel impelled to speak to you tonight, because I have committed my life and career to advancing democracy. I was born in Spain and lived under the dictatorship of Francisco Franco. In addition, as a young woman, I taught English to physicians and scientists in the Soviet Union. Therefore, I have personal experience of what life is like without democracy. I support ranked choice voting, because it is a way of making our democracy more real and vibrant. Ranked choice voting promotes democracy in at least three ways. First, by allowing voters to vote for multiple candidates and rank those candidates by highest to lowest preference. Ranked choice voting offers more choice to voters. Having more choices is central to how many people think about freedom. In these difficult political times, when people are feeling that their civil rights, their due process. and privacy are under attack, preserving democracy is paramount, and having choice is a central component to maintaining democracy. Second, by offering more choice, ranked choice voting promotes higher voter engagement and turnout. States like Maine and Alaska have been using ranked choice voting for their federal elections and have seen a rise in voter turnout. In places that use the ranked-choice voting format, voters feel that they have more influence on the outcomes of elections and thus are more willing to turn out to vote. Like many cities throughout the country, Salem can boost and use a boost in our voter turnout. And third, ranked choice voting de- incentivizes polarization. In the current moment, the political polarization that is paralyzing Congress and much of our politics is dangerous. It's dangerous to our country's political health and public safety. Research has shown that ranked choice voting reduces negative campaign tactics. As a registered independent, I want people to have political and electoral independence and not be driven by the fighting in our two-party system. Ranked choice voting is a strategy to prevent polarization in Salem. Ranked choice voting has been used by over 13 million voters in 23 states and Washington, D.C. It is used in it is used in other countries. It leads to more equitable representation. Generations of Salem residents have fought to make Salem a city that upholds the Constitution of the United States. They believe in and promote democratic practices. I support ranked choice voting because I care deeply about preserving democracy in our beloved city. Bates – Board of Registrars – I am waiting to hear the negatives. I have only heard positives. I did some research on this and I am undecided, I need more information. What is the cost of implementing this and how much would it save us with the elimination of the primary elections? Dennis – The primary elections vary between $30k-$50k and the software costs $12k for the first year and about 10% each year after for the annual licensing fee so there would be a net savings from adopting RCV. Turowski – Eliminating primary election will allow more candidates because there are some that can’t afford two rounds of elections. You would be saving time and money for those running. King – Being in the most contested primary race for city council, I heard a lot of comments that some voters wished that they could rank the candidates because the candidates agreed on a lot of things. It would allow the candidates to talk to the voters. And at the end of the day, it would come down to a decision by the voters on whether they want RCV. Holappa – One of the negatives that I have heard is that it is confusing and complicated. I appreciate the presentation and multi-seat information that used Salem as an example, it really simplified the process. Varela – I think the most contentious thing we need to talk about is tabulating the votes, specifically single seat versus multi- seat elections. The document has a process for calculating multi-seat votes and it is very cut and dry but is there another way to calculate votes? Dennis – This is the most common method used in the US and around the world. It is the same method that has been used in all the city HRP in MA. It is the one used in Minneapolis and Ireland, etc. There are other types, but they are not as highly regarded because they don’t use the same proportionality of results. There are some towns in MA that use a different method and that is mostly because towns generally don’t have more than a 2 seat multi-seat election, so the proportionality doesn’t work the same with only 2 seats as opposed to more than 2 seats. Sydoriak – I wanted to speak to the negatives – The technology piece has been hashed out and was an issue in the past. Having many different candidates might be confusing to people, like the elderly. Will there be any voter education? Dennis – Every jurisdiction that has adopted it has done voter education. There's lots of voter education materials out there. There's an organization called the Ranked Choice Voting Resource Center, a non-profit that's staffed with former election officials that provides free-of-charge information. They'll fly somebody out here for free, any jurisdiction that wants to adopt it, and help with staff, and help run candidate trainings. There's a lot of materials. Simons – I know we have been talking about RCV for a while, and I have been doing elections for 26 years. If this does go to the state and gets approved and there is no primary, will there be education for the voters. I don’t know if there will be an election commission by then, but we are working on getting that together. I have a question on how the recounts will work. Dennis – There are several non-profits that will help with education. There are a lot of free resources for that. Maybe the money saved from primary elections can be used on flyers or materials. Recounts – you can do a recount with any voting method. Sort the ballots by the first choice but there is very detailed information on how that works in the Rank Choice Voting Resource Center that will walk you through how recounts work and how to manage them. Public comment - Elizabeth Bradt – The Salem League of Women Voters and Salem Democrats have a lot of resources to help with voter education. SalemDemocrat.org. Flynn – Has the city solicitor reviewed the language and made suggestions? Rennard – We have been working on this for a long time. We will turn it over to Lauren Goldberg of KP Law. She is the expert on elections, charters and similar HRP. We have already consulted with her on this but if the council votes to move forward we will engage Atty. Goldberg to help us with the language but no red flags on the language to this point. Varela – Motion to refer to the full council with a positive recommendation and seconded by King. Roll call vote – 5-0. Motion to adjourn and seconded by King. Roll call vote to adjourn. 5-0. 7:01PM On the motion of C. Varela and a 5-0 roll call vote, the meeting adjourned at 7:01P.M. ________________________________________________________ (Chairperson)