Don’t Vote – Woo Hoo!

Yesterday evening at the Mercury‘s fun-filled forum on Charter reform, I was delighted to participate in their Five-minutes-on-each-of-the-Others section at the end of the program. The Main Event was the Form of Government proposal, covered by Anna Griffin on City Hall Blog. After more than an hour of often-serious debate, it was hard for many in the audience to hunker down to review the other three measures. One basic tenet for encouraging public participation is to help people understand why they should care about an issue, and there have been very few attempts by people in power in Portland to engage citizens in understanding the importance of the measures on future Charter review, Civil Service, and PDC. Those in favor set up the ballot titles and descriptions to sound like motherhood-and-apple-pie; perhaps they don’t want to promote discussion because the measures have big flaws when citizens look more closely. Those opposed are worried about the form of government measure, and hope (without reason, I think) that citizens will vote No on everything if they become convinced 26-91 should fail. After last night’s forum, I’m even more concerned about the absence of “community conversation” on Measures 26-89, 26-90, and 26-92.

During my comments, I made the recommendation taught by the League of Women Voters in training Speakers Bureau volunteers, that “It’s OK not to vote on a particular issue if you don’t feel you know enough to make a reasoned decision.” Scott Moore of the Mercury, who with Amy Jenniges was moderating the debate, laughed and said, “That may be the first time anyone’s ever come to a Bus Project event and encouraged people not to vote!”

Which got me thinking. I agree with both the League of Women Voters in the virtue of not filling in a bubble if you don’t understand the question, and the Bus Project in encouraging people to participate. The two aren’t mutually exclusive. You can turn in a ballot, duly signed and delivered before the deadline, with no bubbles filled in – and you’re counted as having voted. In election returns, there is a number listed for each question as “Undervote”. That means, a ballot was turned in, but no bubble was marked for that question. [“Overvote” means two or more bubbles were filled in, and that voter’s choice(s) on the question was voided.] The undervote, in particular, is indicative of “Don’t know”. I was very sad last year when I saw the large number in the undervote column in my race for City Council. It represented people who cared enough to turn in their ballot, but for whatever reason didn’t choose one of the seven candidates in our race. The undervote isn’t listed in the final tally on Multnomah County’s election site, but just adding up the number of votes shows 101,300 people voted for a candidate in Seat 2, won by Erik Sten with 51,208 votes (50.55%). Only 92,594 voters chose someone in Seat 3, with Dan Saltzman’s vote total at 56,433. Perhaps of I had done just a few things even a little better, some of the 8,706 people who knew who they wanted in Seat 2 but not in Seat 3, might have come to know me slightly more than the other six, marked my bubble, and made the difference between a runoff and taking the summer off. Trust me, politicians and campaign strategists notice the undervote.

I believe “I don’t know” is a valid and valuable answer to a question. A large undervote on one to four of these ballot measures would send a message to those who insisted on putting these Charter changes on the May ballot, then didn’t come through with the promised “community conversation” to engage voters, that the process was flawed and should not be repeated.

Voters should care enough to send in a ballot, and indicate by not making a choice on a measure if they haven’t had enough information to give a reasoned decision. Of course, I would rather citizens take the time to read the 80 pages of Form of Government changes, 7 pages for PDC, 2 pages (and the 5 pages deleted from the current Charter) on Civil Service, and 2 new paragraphs on Charter Review, and Vote No on all four with me. But I know most won’t. And I believe Constitutional changes should not be made based on “Meh, sounds good” or “Meh, sounds bad” reasoning. If you don’t understand these proposed Charter changes, you can turn in your ballot without making a choice on 26-89, 26-90, 26-91, and/or 26-92. Or follow my reasoning, and vote No. No is good, too 🙂

The Bus Project’s main focus is engaging young people, signing them up to register and encouraging them to vote. But I know from talking with high school and college students, that many don’t vote because they don’t feel they know enough to make good choices. Remember, this generation of young people has been raised on standardized testing. In most multiple choice tests, a wrong answer deducts points from the final score, to discourage guesswork. Unless students are more certain than not, they’re trained to leave questions blank. So if they’re pressured to fill in a bubble when they haven’t had the curriculum content, they tend to not vote at all. We need to make sure voters understand the virtues of the undervote. It doesn’t serve democracy if citizens are choosing which bubble to fill based on whose name sounds most friendly/interesting, or which ballot title sounds good even if the details buried in the measure aren’t (coughMeasure 37cough). In addition to registering voters and going the extra mile to help educate citizens on important issues, we should be informing new and seasoned voters that, just like in standardized testing, it’s best to leave a question blank if you aren’t more sure than unsure of your answer. And still turn in your ballot, so your undervote counts.